Geopolitics Review Extra - 23rd July 2024

Biden Withdraws From Presidential Race

Contents

1. Introduction

2. Biden Withdraws

3. Kamala Harris Endorsed

4. What Next?

5. Concluding Remarks

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Bitesize Edition

• Biden announced on Sunday that he would indeed be withdrawing from the presidential election in November. Anybody on Substack found out about the potential for this to occur on Thursday, three days before it actually happened. Sounds like another win for Substack, right?

• It was questioned if Biden was forced to step down by those with influence within the Democratic Party, namely Nancy Pelosi. Whether true or not, for the Democrat’s chances in November, we had to see a change. We’ve seen many endorse Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee since Biden stepped down, including Biden himself. In fact, Harris gained $81M in campaign donations in the first 24 hours, a record-setting amount.

• The Democrats can now assess the lay of the land in this election, and focus on key demographics where Harris polls better than Biden and Trump. Whoever becomes the presidential nominee will select a vice president. This selection by the Democrats can also strategically attempt to gain influence in a closely contested swing state such as Michigan or Pennsylvania.

• As for the Republicans, Trump was on a roll after surviving an assassination attempt. He and JD Vance will now have to pivot completely and have already slandered Harris on social media. Harris was tasked with addressing immigration during Biden’s presidency, and immigration remains an issue, worsening throughout the last four years. It’s improving after his executive order last month stopping asylum at the border, but it still provides fuel for Trump to attack Harris. When it comes to geopolitics and her role on the global stage, Harris is fairly inexperienced, another potential avenue of attack Trump could pursue.

• These contests of rhetoric and policy differences between Trump and the new Democratic nominee will become clear over the coming weeks, with Harris already receiving enough delegates to become the candidate for the Democrats. Hence, it will likely be Harris. The next question then turns to when she will be chosen. A virtual roll-call is rumoured to be held before August 7th of the Democratic delegates. If it doesn't occur before then, the Democratic Convention occurs in the middle of August, and could also be used to select a nominee.

• It has certainly been a fast-moving few weeks in politics and geopolitics around the world, and so I’ve written this extra post. Let’s dive in below.

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Introduction

Last Thursday, we heard the first whisperings that Biden was set to step down over the weekend. It was broken by

Mark Halperin

here on Substack, and came to fruition on Sunday.

As I stated on Substack Notes on Sunday evening, this is a clear indication of how powerful a place Substack already is, and the potential this platform has as a place of collaboration, knowledge, and deep, considered analysis on the internet. Also, huge credit to Mark for breaking this topic days before it occurred. We’ve seen Seymour Hersh break his analysis on the Nord Stream Pipeline sabotage also when other news sources were littered in misinformation and confusion. If you don’t have the Substack App, please get it. Support writers who are proven to demonstrate transparency, news, and trust. You won’t regret it.

Now, I’ll explore the process that led Biden to step down, why he endorsed Kamala Harris, and what happens next.

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Biden Withdraws

It was clear for a time that Joe Biden’s cognition was slowing down. For fragmented American politics, many Democrat voters would still have voted for Biden because voting for Trump is unimaginable to them. The difference in approaches to the next presidency, and the direction of the United States for the two parties are canyons apart.

It’s unfortunate that it came to Biden stepping down, but it had to occur. Biden's not being cognitively-able led to questions as to whether he is truly running the United States. If this is being asked now, he certainly would have been four years from now.

Biden had, of course, been considering the comments about his cognition for many weeks, especially after the presidential election debate. Only four days ago, he asked for unity amongst the Democrats to back his campaign. Why the sudden change and the withdrawal? Sources have noted Obama has expressed concern privately about Biden’s ability to run for president, and Nancy Pelosi, the former Democratic House speaker, has reportedly been pulling strings behind the scenes to encourage others to push Biden to withdraw. One source even stated Pelosi would commit to “the easy way or the hard way.” We seemingly saw Biden convinced of “the easy way”.

It was debated if Biden was staying in the race in an effort to protect his son, Hunter. Hunter was convicted of all three felonies in his federal gun trial in June after he lied about his drug use on a form when he purchased a handgun in 2018. A criminal tax trial against Hunter is also set to begin on September 9th after he is charged with evading $1.4M in taxes between 2016 and 2019.

Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash

As Biden isolates himself at his beach house in Delaware with COVID, a social media craze is stirring that he was forced out through a coup, pushed by Nancy Pelosi from within the Democratic Party. Many are even questioning if Biden is alive. I’m sure this will end up being social media noise and conspiracy theories spiralling out of control.

What was clear was that the Democrats recognised that Biden firstly wouldn’t last another four years cognitively, and secondly, was getting steamrolled by Trump in the election campaign process. Signing away the 2024 election to try again in 2028 wasn’t an option for the Democrats. After a four-year Trump Presidency, we could live in a dramatically different world in 2028. They had to make a change and it could well have been forced upon Biden after three weeks of rejecting calls to step down. It was stated that the eventual reason Biden stepped down was new polling data. This data showed Biden losing many swing states, including Michigan, North Carolina, and Georgia. He was also losing support in New Mexico and Virginia, states predicted to lean Democrat in November.

The Democrats now stand a much stronger chance of challenging Trump moving forward. The change had to be made. Biden marked his withdrawal with a clear endorsement of his Vice President, Kamala Harris.