Biden dropping out complicates presidential election picture
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
President Joe Biden's decision to drop his reelection campaign creates major uncertainty for a Democratic Party that will soon have to select a nominee, a University of Missouri political science professor told ABC 17 News on Monday.
"It's highly unprecedented," said assistant professor Charles Zug, who works at the Kinder Institute for Constitional Democracy. "Neither party has seen anything this dramatic in terms of a late-stage campaign development in a really long time.”
The last sitting president to drop his reelection was Lyndon Johnson in 1968.
Delegates at national conventions for the parties will select the presidential nominee. The candidate must have a majority vote to participate in the general election.
Delegates are people who represent the state or community at presidential national conventions.
Zug says Biden dropping out makes it complicated for the Democratic Party and National Convention because normally, the delegated nominee has been selected by this time.
"Now that he's decided to withdraw, all of those delegates, who are just party officials, who will convene in Chicago in a few weeks, they have to now vote to figure out who's going to replace Biden," Zug said. "There's no automatic process for switching the delegates who were chosen to support Biden automatically to Harris who's now trying to replace Biden."
The Democratic National Convention is set to take place Aug. 19-22 in Chicago.
According to the Associated Press, the Democratic Party will have about 3,900 delegates voting at the Democratic National Convention and more than 4,600 delegates for a second round of voting if needed.
