The Democrat Party is moving to bar primary challengers to President Joe Biden from state ballots across the country. In Florida, Democrat leaders effectively canceled the party’s the March 19 presidential primary by using party rules to name Biden as the only official candidate. Under the state’s election law, uncontested presidential primary races do not appear on the ballot – meaning for Florida Democrats, their state party decided the 2024 Democrat nominee for them.
“Americans would expect the absence of democracy in Tehran, not Tallahassee,” Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) said in a statement regarding the state party’s decision. The multi-millionaire Congressman, who warned his fellow Democrats earlier this year they were “sleepwalking into a repeat of 2016”, announced he would challenge Biden for the Democrat presidential nomination in late October. Marianne Williamson, a perennial Democrat presidential candidate known for her eccentric views, said her campaign is looking in to taking legal action against the state party over their decision.
While not unheard of – some state parties used similar maneuvers to prevent primary challenges to Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama – raise concerns the Democrat Party is increasingly any equating opposition to their agenda as being ‘opposed to democracy’. Democrat Party aligned groups have backed legal challenges in several states as part of an effort to kick former President Donald Trump off of the 2024 presidential ballot. They argue the 14th Amendment’s ‘Insurrection Clause’ bars Trump from being elected to office.
“The Democratic Party is actively seeking to deny voters choices in this election, supposedly to save democracy,” law professor Jonathan Turley warned in The Hill, adding: “Henry Ford once promised customers any color so long as it is black. Democrats are adopting the same approach to the election: You can have any candidate on the ballot, as long as it’s Joe Biden.”
