Michelle Obama, via a spokeswoman, just said she wouldn’t accept the Democratic Party’s nomination for president this year. Or did she?
“As former First Lady Michelle Obama has expressed several times over the years, she will not be running for president,” the statement noted. “Mrs. Obama supports President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ re-election campaign.”
This is miles away from a “Sherman statement.” The Union Civil War general famously declared in 1884, “I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected.” He had already said some years previously, “I hereby state, and mean all that I say, that I never have been and never will be a candidate for president; that if nominated by either party I should peremptorily decline; and even if unanimously elected I should decline to serve.”
Similarly, when President Lyndon Johnson was humiliated by a massively strong showing from Minnesota’s anti-Vietnam war Sen. Eugene McCarthy in the 1968 New Hampshire primary, he declared in a national television address later that month that “I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your president.”
A Democrat Dilemma
Consider the dilemma now unfolding for Democrats. It gets objectively clearer with every latest public appearance that President Joe Biden is in steep cognitive decline, the executive branch obviously under the direction of behind-the-scenes West Wing surrogates; undoubtedly a second Biden term, while featuring the octogenarian going through some ceremonial motions of the presidency, would be an entirely staff-run affair. That is until the day that the even-less-popular and under-performing Kamala Harris steps into the 46th president’s shoes, an eventuality likely to happen sooner rather than later.
Add to this the fact that President Biden’s performance on policy is underwater in polling. Illegal immigration and border security have become the top issue to Americans this election year largely because President Biden reversed the deportation policies not only of Donald Trump but of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, too—the latter of whom deported millions of illegal immigrants. Disapproval for President Biden’s immigration policies dwarfs that for his handling of the economy and other issues.
But is it legally possible to yank the nomination away from President Biden, a sitting president whose challengers in the primaries are a third-term congressman representing the Minneapolis suburbs and a self-help guru touted as Oprah Winfrey’s spiritual adviser, both of whom have failed to get any traction? The answer, almost certainly, is no.
That does not mean, however, that pressure, both public and private, cannot be tactfully and effectively brought to bear against the president, of the kind on which President Richard Nixon was on the receiving end as impeachment and conviction in the Senate over Watergate beckoned in August 1974. While Nixon likely already knew he would soon have to relinquish the presidency, a visit to the White House by 1964 Republican presidential nominee Sen. Barry Goldwater of Arizona, Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott of Pennsylvania, and House Minority Leader John Rhodes to describe his dismal lack of support in Congress proved to be the last straw and Nixon announced his departure the following evening.
In the case of President Biden, the visit from party chiefs might have to be to the first lady. One could imagine Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, both of New York, covertly visiting the East Wing to implore Jill Biden, famously protective of the president, to help them prevent his humiliation and the tarnishing of his legacy. Mention would likely be made to her that the two feel it is their duty to the nation to prevent another Trump presidency, and that they have been seriously considering a public announcement of their doubts about the president’s ability to win in November, and even of their concerns at his age of performing the duties of the office.
A Possible Obama Run
Discard the far-from-Shermanesque new statement from her office, as well as the silly accusations that even to suggest Michelle is to be duped into a right-wing conspiracy theory, or that she loathes politics and loves the anonymity of her husband’s post-presidency. You don’t agree to an interview on a podcast that reaches millions of people, as she did in January, and tell of your sleepless nights because “I am terrified about what could possibly happen, because our leaders matter” and that “we cannot take this democracy for granted, and sometimes I worry that we do” if you’ve forsworn the political arena.Her carefully cultivated reputation of shyness and disdain for politics only enhances her popularity and the excitement that will take hold when she becomes the rabbit the Democratic Party pulls out of its hat at the convention in Michelle’s hometown of Chicago in August. Her studied demeanor is the smartest of strategies.
Another Surprise?
Another rabbit from another hat, however, is well worth betting on, given the facts in her favor. We have heard President Trump drop the names of his defeated rivals as potential running mates: Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, populist entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, as well as Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota. But President Trump has said that he has already decided on a running mate, and it is in his feisty, mischievous nature to keep the name of his real choice to himself. Moreover, if he really has already decided, it is likely someone he knows very well.Sarah Huckabee Sanders, at 41 the youngest governor in the country—and, having issued executive orders banning critical race theory in public schools and repealing COVID mandates and shutdowns, may be the most conservative governor too—wiped the floor with what President Trump loves calling the “Fake Media” on a daily basis as his White House press secretary. And she has been unfailingly loyal to him since, formally endorsing him last November. The traditional job of running mate as pugilistic defender of the top of the ticket, which politicians as disparate as President Biden himself in 2008 and 2012 and Spiro Agnew in 1968 and 1972 performed effectively, seems custom fit for Ms. Sanders.
What’s more, as with Ms. Obama, she brings a political wise man along with her, her father and predecessor as Arkansas governor, former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee. Both father and daughter have a record of generating excitement among their fellow evangelicals and other components of the populist GOP base.
Should this quite logical, if uncanny, scenario materialize—in effect, Michelle versus Sarah—it will mean both parties recognizing that suburban women are the key to victory in 2024 and employing two accomplished mothers to duel with one another in appealing to that segment of the electorate. But if both President Biden’s infirmity and President Trump’s legal woes can be neutralized to bring the Democrats’ record over the last four years into sharp focus, the polling indicates that it will be advantage GOP.
But it will require debunking the notion that Michelle Obama is a more attractive version of what President Trump is seen as by his supporters—a non-politician who answered the call of his country even though he didn’t have to, and perhaps didn’t even really want to. In the excitement of such an unprecedented and earth-shaking event as Michelle stepping in, bursting her bubble will be far from easy.
