There were no winners in the recent presidential debate. There were only losers — the American people — and we have the two major political parties to blame for the fiasco.
While former President Donald Trump had a much stronger performance, his answers, when he bothered to answer the question, were primarily lies — and big ones at that.
President Joe Biden, on the other hand, failed miserably for all the world to see.
Last September, I asked readers to imagine a scenario in which we fast forwarded to September 2024. In the imagined scenario, Biden and Trump each had received their respective party’s nominations. Trump had been convicted in the federal trial for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and his other trials were ongoing. The American people had learned enough through the trials that a majority of the electorate thought Trump should be disqualified from holding the office of the presidency.
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All the while, President Biden’s approval numbers remained low, with Vice President Kamala Harris’ even lower. Biden then had a major health event and both confidence in him and enthusiasm for the general election tanks.
While I was not exactly right. I was also not far off.
Trump’s trials, other than the New York case, have been delayed. Yet he was still convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in a case stemming from silencing a porn star ahead of the 2016 election.
Current voters also have all the information they need regarding the events around the 2020 election and Jan. 6 to make an informed decision on whether or not Trump should be barred from holding the highest office in the land.
While Biden has not suffered a major health event, his debate performance has certainly demonstrated to the American people that he is too old to be president for another four years. Especially in the midst of world turmoil.
In the September 2023 column, I wrote in support of the No Labels’ effort to gain ballot access as an insurance policy if something like the above happened. No Labels gained ballot access in 24 states before shutting their efforts down in April due to an inability to find candidates who were willing to buck their party’s establishment.
No Labels has come forward and shared that political elites and operatives — mainly from the Democratic party — started aligning against them. No Labels Chief Strategist Ryan Clancy wrote the following in an email: “[T]he political hacks working against us decided to spread every lie they could about our effort, at one point even hijacking our website to make it look like we were a pro-Trump group.”
As of today, both parties are set to nominate the two candidates that the American electorate has been screaming for almost two years now that they do not want. The parties have also successfully robbed Americans of a third choice.
There is no chance that the GOP will nominate someone other than Trump in just a couple of weeks at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
The Democrats, on the other hand, are currently in the midst of a post-debate panic. Many, including me and the Post-Dispatch Editorial Board, have suggested Biden step aside and allow the Democratic Party to nominate a new ticket during their convention in August in Chicago. As of this writing, that has not happened.
The Democratic Party still has a chance to find an alternative candidate who can energetically communicate a bold and forward-looking vision of America’s identity. Maybe that is Vice President Kamala Harris, or maybe another Democrat will emerge.
This individual would need to connect to the electorate in a way that Biden just cannot do anymore — a way that is the opposite from the Republicans’ current populist, America-First agenda, which is anathema to the American Dream.
A political party’s primary goal is to get candidates elected. Further down on the list of responsibilities is the role of gatekeeper. Both parties have failed us (and down-ballot candidates) miserably.
While both parties are complicit, this is not a false equivalency. The Republican Party is no longer a functioning party. Their obligations lie with one man. They no longer offer a real party platform and they certainly have rid themselves of any monitors.
If Biden and the Democratic Party fail to offer an alternative and the Republicans nominate a convicted felon, then Americans should demand and work for something or someone new and fresh in 2028.
Perhaps it is a good thing that the debate occurred the week before America’s birthday. July 4 is the perfect time to be thinking about the experiment that is our democratic republic and to lean into that innovative spirit.
Our great country deserves so much better than the choices before us. The first party to figure that out will be successful. And if neither does, then it is time for a new way.
Schmidt is a Post-Dispatch columnist and Editorial Board member. SchmidtOpinions@gmail.com. On X: @SchmidtOpinions.