When Joe Biden was the presumptive Democratic nominee in the 2020 presidential race, he talked about what he wanted in a vice president.
“I need someone who’s going to be, as Barack said, ‘simpatico with me,’ who is a real partner in progress and is ready to be president on a moment’s notice,” Biden said in reference to his eight years as vice president during the Obama administration.
Biden chose Kamala Harris, then a senator from California. Now, four years and one very disastrous debate later, some believe that the “moment’s notice” Biden once considered may have arrived — but the president isn’t one of them.
Despite increasing pressure from within his own party to drop out of the presidential race, Biden has reiterated that he will be his party’s nominee at next month’s Democratic National Convention. In a letter to congressional Democrats on Monday, he wrote, “The question of how to move forward has been well-aired for over a week now. And it’s time for it to end. We have one job. And that is to beat Donald Trump.”
While six House Democrats, including Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, have publicly stated that Biden should get out of the race, none of them are members of the Congressional Black Caucus.
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During a CNN interview on Tuesday, Representative Troy Carter of Louisiana, the CBC’s second vice chair said, “Let there be no confusion — we are 100 percent behind President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris to continue the work that they’ve done toward making our country stronger, our economy better, and our relationships abroad better.”
The Congressional Hispanic Caucus is also backing Biden.
To defeat Trump and to survive the greatest crisis of his presidency, Biden also needs support from the same demographic that made him a viable candidate and the winning nominee in 2020 — Black people. But he is refusing to step aside for the woman of color who has been his vice president for three and a half years.
In the aftermath of Biden’s debate debacle — and yes, Trump also had a lousy debate unless you’re into 90 minutes of lies and terrible moderators — such names as Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Governor Gavin Newsom of California were among those mentioned as possible replacements.
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But in those initial prognostications, Harris was seemingly overlooked. That began to change in a July 2 post on X by Tim Ryan, a former Democratic congressman from Ohio, who all but endorsed Harris as his party’s best hope in November. “[Harris] has significantly grown into her job, she will destroy Trump in [the] debate, highlight [the] choice issue, energize our base, bring back young voters, and give us generational change. It’s time!” Others, including Representative Adam Smith of Washington state and Representative Adam Schiff of California, have echoed Ryan’s thoughts.
Of course, Biden has shown no inclination toward relinquishing to anyone his position as his party’s probable nominee. But Ryan is right — Harris has significantly grown into what is by design a job that means standing in and being obscured by the president’s shadow.
Representing a series of historic firsts — the first woman vice president and the first person of color to be first in the presidential line of succession — it was never going to be easy for Harris. Early stumbles were magnified. There were intimations that Harris should be replaced as Biden’s running mate.
Some people, usually men, picked at things they found off-putting about Harris, like her laugh. (This weird gripe also targeted Hillary Clinton, and let’s just think about why many men find a powerful woman’s laugh or, perhaps, her joy so irritating.)
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But Harris distinguished herself in 2022 after the conservative-led Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. While pundits claimed voters had moved on from abortion, Harris focused and framed the right-wing erosion of reproductive rights as an attack on health care that would not end with the high court’s ruinous decision. Speaking to young voters, especially women on college campuses, allowed Democrats to expand their Senate majority and helped save the House from a Republican landslide.
She has silenced at least some of the doubters and proven herself an asset to the Democratic ticket. If she became the nominee, at the very least, she would flip the age and competency question since Trump is nearly 20 years older and has his own issues with mental acuity.
On the off-chance that Biden bows out she is his natural successor, although as my Globe colleague Kimberly Atkins Stohr pointed out last week “presidential campaigns are not fantasy sports leagues” where one player can be easily swapped out for another.
When Biden formally introduced Harris as his running mate in 2020, they walked across the stage of a Delaware high school to the sounds of Curtis Mayfield’s “Move on Up,” with its anthemic refrain of resilience and hope in the face of tribulation:
Bite your lip
And take the trip
Though there may be wet road ahead
And you cannot slip
In the past two weeks, the road to victory in November has become even more treacherous. This is a complicated and uncharted dilemma; Harris could be the answer. Because if Democrats want to save this country and its democracy, neither they nor an increasingly defiant Biden can afford another catastrophic slip.
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Renée Graham is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at renee.graham@globe.com. Follow her @reneeygraham.
