The party of democracy keeps editing the results
Democrats increasingly treat their voters’ choices as provisional because party activists and much of the political press allow it. From Joe Biden’s replacement in 2024 to current attacks on Senator John Fetterman (D-Penn.), the party establishment respects election results only until those results become inconvenient. That habit damages the party’s credibility on election integrity and may eventually damage the establishment itself.
Two years ago, Democrats already had their presidential nominee. Joe Biden had won every Democratic presidential contest except American Samoa and faced no serious challenge (unlike Jimmy Carter in 1980). He had also won the 2020 nomination and occupied the White House.
Democratic leaders keep courting the left’s energy while blocking some of its candidates from power. That arrangement cannot last forever.
After Biden’s disastrous debate performance, however, Democrat officials and donors spent weeks demanding that he withdraw. Their pressure campaign set aside months of primaries in which roughly 14 million Democrats had supported him. No presumptive major-party nominee in the modern primary era had withdrawn so late.
Democrats did use a formal replacement process. Biden’s withdrawal unbound nearly all of his delegates, Harris qualified for the ballot, and during a virtual roll-call vote, 99% of participating delegates voted for her. But primary voters never chose Harris for president in 2024, and party leaders never held an open convention in which competing candidates could make their case. By the convention, Harris and Tim Walz were already the ticket.
That was the first do-over: Primary voters chose Biden, and delegates later chose Harris after party leaders drove Biden from the race.
Maine supplied a clearer example this year. Voters nominated Graham Platner for Senate with more than 156,000 votes. After a woman accused Platner of rape — an allegation he denied — he withdrew on the last day Maine law allowed Democrats to replace him on the ballot.
Party delegates then selected Troy Jackson, who had not competed in the Senate primary and had finished third in the gubernatorial primary, by a 566-5 vote. The party followed Maine law, but primary voters had no say in their replacement nominee.
Wisconsin shows another kind of intervention. After the establishment favorite left the governor’s race amid campaign-finance trouble, David Crowley re-entered with Gov. Tony Evers’ backing and narrowly defeated democratic socialist Francesca Hong. Voters made the final choice, so Wisconsin was no do-over. It does show how quickly party leaders mobilize when the left threatens to capture a nomination.
Pennsylvania now shows another variation of the fix. Democrats nominated Fetterman for Senate in 2022 and stood by him after a serious stroke.
They called Fetterman a fighter and a maverick, just what the Senate needed. When he won, Senate Democrats rallied around him and even loosened the dress code for him. Then he broke with progressives over Israel, arguing that it had a right to defend itself after Hamas’ terrorist attack.
A recent Wall Street Journal report said Fetterman had neglected many Senate duties, citing accounts from former staffers. Some Democrat lawmakers and activists immediately attacked him; one Democratic National Committee vice chairman said “2028 can’t come soon enough.” Depart from party orthodoxy, and you’re through.
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This pattern succeeds because party voters rarely punish it and much of the political press treats each episode as an isolated event. Voters whose choices party leaders set aside receive little sustained attention. Nothing to see here. Move along.
Repeatedly overriding primary outcomes also weakens Democrats’ claims to defend election integrity. If they don’t care about their own members’ votes, they don’t care about yours. No wonder they oppose election oversight when they want to overlook their own primaries.
The establishment’s short-term victories may carry long-term costs. In 2016, DNC officials favored Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders. Yet Sanders and his faction now exert more influence over the party than Clinton does.
The Democratic left has grown stronger even as establishment figures try to contain it. Each intervention deepens resentment among activists who believe party leaders accept their votes only when they approve the result.
Democrat leaders keep courting the left’s energy while blocking some of its candidates from power. That arrangement cannot last forever.
Eventually, procedural trickery will no longer protect the Democrat establishment from the faction it has encouraged but repeatedly tried to keep off the ballot.
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