Dean Phillips Is Not Helping the Democrats (or His Career)

Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN)

In 1980, Sen. Ted Kennedy did something that he had avoided for a decade-he ran for president.  Kennedy had long been considered a contender for the Democratic nomination for President, in the same way that his brothers had been.  Kennedy had spent a decade flirting with the White House, considering a run in 1972 but the death of Mary Jo Kopechne in 1969 at Chappaquiddick, MA, cast such a pall on his career that not only would he not run in 1972, it would stop him from running in 1976 (when he probably had the best shot at victory), and would eventually lead him (in part) to losing the Democratic primary in 1980 to then President Carter.

That run in 1980 would represent a turning point in presidential politics.  Until that time, it was relatively common, though not as common as it was in the 19th Century, for a presidential incumbent to have to face sitting members of Congress in a primary.  In 1968, for example, before he dropped out of the race for the White House, President Johnson was in a battle with two sitting senators (Eugene McCarthy & Robert Kennedy) and in 1952, Sen. Estes Kefauver had run against President Harry Truman before he stood aside.  But in 1980, when Kennedy lost to Carter, but severely wounded him, Carter's subsequent loss to Ronald Reagan was attributed to Kennedy having hurt him in the primaries (whether this is true or not is a debate for a different article, but it's been a criticism for decades).  In the decades that followed, no president of either party has had to face a sitting member of Congress in a presidential primary.

This could change in 2024, but not with someone as noted as Kefauver, McCarthy, or the Kennedy brothers.  Instead, Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota (my congressman, in fact) has made a lot of comments in recent days criticizing President Biden, and has stated that he wants a serious, moderate candidate to run against the president due to Biden's low approval ratings, and tight head-to-head matchup polls against former President Donald Trump, Biden's likely 2024 Republican opponent.

There's a lot to unpack here, but I'll start with answering the most pertinent question you have: who the hell is Dean Phillips?  A backbench member of Congress, Phillips was first elected during the Democratic wave of 2018.  That year he beat incumbent-Republican Erik Paulsen by a significant margin in a district that had long supported moderate Republicans like Paulsen and Jim Ramstad, but had shifted blue on a presidential level (it had voted for Hillary Clinton by 9-points, and would vote for Biden by nearly 20-points in 2020.  The district is now solidly blue, not just due to shifting demographics but also a slight redraw in Phillips' favor, and even in an arguably good year for the Republicans in 2022, he still won by 19-points last year as he was elected to a third term.  Phillips otherwise has no history in politics-heir to a distilling fortune and the grandson of Pauline Phillips (better known to millions of American newspaper readers as "Dear Abby"), he was most known for running the Talenti gelato company.

Phillips criticisms of Biden are not entirely without merit.  He's right that Biden is old, and given a completely blank slate, a lot of Democrats would probably wish to have someone 20-30 years younger representing them against Trump.  He's also right that Biden is not popular.  Though most pundits (including me) assume that Biden's approval ratings will recover in the coming year as Democrats accept him as their nominee (and that we'll have a rematch election whether they want it or not), right now his numbers are poor, and Democrats shouldn't be complacent about them.

But Phillips is ignoring the reality of 1980, and every election since.  Ousting an incumbent president is basically impossible in American politics in the digital age, and the only thing that happens in having a serious debate about Biden's qualifications is to invite a splintered base heading into next year's elections.  Public polling shows that Biden leads virtually every matchup against actual candidates (and not just "do you want to keep Biden?"), even against candidates that have no chance or running who are far better known than Phillips (like Michelle Obama or Kamala Harris).  Going against Biden at this point would be political suicide for the Democrats-saying he was too old would invite criticisms of him currently in office, and would open him to easy attacks from the Republicans.  Basically, despite Phillips complaints to the contrary, a primary challenge to Biden is the single best way to get Donald Trump a second term.  Democrats chose Biden, in retrospect the only person who could beat Trump in 2020...the devil's bargain of that was that they had to put up with him running in 2024.

What is clear, though, is that Phillips is playing with fire in his own career.  Because while Biden isn't going to lose (with or without Dean Phillips in the race, the reality is that if Biden can't run, it'll be Kamala Harris, not someone else, who is the nominee), Dean Phillips certainly can.  Phillips has reportedly gotten a private chastisement from House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, and is potentially putting his position as Vice Chair of the DPCC at risk with these calls for a moderate challenger to Biden.  He has gotten public criticisms from Minnesota Democratic Party Chair Ken Martin & Rep. Ilhan Omar, and already it appears that he might earn a primary challenge.  Former State Sen. Melisa Lopez Franzen was initially thought of as an option, but she's just taken a job with the University of Minnesota, so I doubt that she's going to do it, but if I was an ambitious Democrat in an increasingly blue district, I'd seriously consider taking Phillips on here as he's uniquely vulnerable (I sure as hell won't vote for him if a real challenger emerges in the primary).  Biden might not be vulnerable for the nomination in 2024, but Dean Phillips cannot say as much.