Uncharted Territory

Sunday afternoon, President Joe Biden’s Twitter account announced that he would not stand for reelection, despite having won the Democratic primaries. This is an unprecedented development in American history, as no presumptive nominee has ever dropped out this late in an election. After the New Hampshire primary in March 1968, President Lyndon Johnson announced that he would not continue running for a second full term. That remains a far cry from Biden winning the primaries but dropping out before the Democratic National Convention.

In any case, American elections have always been in uncharted territory of some sort:

• Prior to 1788, America had never ratified a constitution.
• Prior to 1796, the US never had any president besides George Washington.
• Prior to 1824, we never had a situation where no candidate won a majority in the electoral college and the House bypassed the person with the most votes.
• Prior to 1841, no president had died in office, and nobody quite knew what succession entailed.
• Prior to 1860, we had never elected a Republican to the presidency, nor had we engaged in a Civil War.
• Prior to 1865, no president had ever been assassinated.
• Prior to 1877, we never had a situation that required a special commission to determine if certain electoral votes were valid or not.
• Prior to 1892, no former president had ever won reelection to a second nonconsecutive term. (It could happen again in November!)
• Prior to 1940, no president had won more than two terms.
• Prior to 1972, no president had won a 49 state landslide. It would happen again just 12 years later.
• Prior to 1974, no president had ever resigned from office.
• Prior to 2000, no presidential election had to be decided by a Supreme Court ruling.
• Prior to 2020, mail in balloting and ballot harvesting was not widespread.
• Prior to 2024, a candidate who won his party’s primaries had never stepped down before the convention.

Every one of these events altered the course of history, bringing us to where we are today. Our current crisis will once again change the trajectory of the American Republic, no matter how it turns out in the end.

One thing that has changed is the pretense that the president actually runs the country. As of this writing, no member of the press or the public has seen President Biden in days, despite a letter being issued in his name explaining why he was no longer running for reelection. Those of us on the right who are plugged in to politics understand the way in which the administrative state actually calls the shots, but for the average citizen it must come as a surprise.

Donald Trump is not running against a person so much as he is running against a system. It doesn’t matter who the Democrats prop up as their candidate — Biden, Harris, Newsom, Whitmer, etc. — because that person is merely the figurehead for an incredibly powerful network of bureaucrats that are carrying out an agenda that was never mandated by the American people.

The Democrats have now set another precedent. If polling shows a nominee poised to lose the presidential election, the party can simply lean on him to drop out and be replaced by someone else. I bet Democrats are kicking themselves that they did not think of this weird trick sooner. Imagine replacing George McGovern in 1972 or Walter Mondale in 1984 once they knew they were in for historic losses.

The Democrats have decided that the primary contests are meaningless. What does it matter if a candidate won a majority of delegates via state primaries and caucuses if he can simply step down before the convention? This actually marks a return to an older style of politics. Before 1972, nominations were often decided at the convention itself rather than through the primary system.

The question now before the American people is about whether this complete inversion of the nomination process is acceptable. Does it matter than the number of ballots case does not actually reflect the number of voters making a choice? Does it matter that the primaries were all for show, and that the Democratic Party will simply select a candidate less than four months before the election?

Will voters simply rubber stamp these shenanigans, ensuring the final victory of the administrative state and the ultimate end of the American Republic? Or will they say no, you can’t go changing the rules of the game halfway through the fourth quarter, and reject this farcical pretense and demand a return to the American tradition of actually electing our leaders?

One of my Twitter mutuals put it well this morning:

We are witnessing a coup by the Total State, removing a US President at the drop of a hat via a single point of entry (POTUS’ X account). Absolutely insane stuff, with tremendous implications including the inherent fragility of the Regime itself and the complete destruction of any remaining pretenses of the “system”. What’s the point of “democracy” if you can cheat an election, steal a Presidency, coup the guy who stole it, depose him and effectively hold him hostage, launching a fait accompli via a single Twitter account?

The next four months will be a stress test of the American system of governance. Are we resilient enough to survive this crisis and emerge stronger, or has the Republic already fallen, and this will be the year that exposes that fact for all to see?

Only time will tell.

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