Biden rode the perception of electability to victory in 2020. But now it may be his undoing.
Joe Biden’s superpower inside the Democratic Party has been the belief he can beat Donald Trump — a belief that helped him prevail in the crowded 2020 primary campaign.
Joe Biden’s superpower inside the Democratic Party has been the belief he can beat Donald Trump — a belief that helped him prevail in the crowded 2020 primary campaign. But electability is quickly becoming his potential kryptonite as members of his party worry he’s poised to lose re-election and bring down everyone else with him.
“Live by the electability, die by the electability,” said Seth Masket, the director of the Center on American Politics at Denver University and author of a book about recent Democratic presidential primaries.
Several Democrats held their fire after Biden's disastrous debate performance, waiting to see how the criticism would play out in the polls. As the numbers have trickled in, the picture is complicated — meaning it neither quieted nor supercharged the calls for him to step aside.
On Wednesday, that was on display as a handful of Democrats joined the numbers saying he should drop out of the race while one of the most senior leaders of the party, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, refused to stake out a strong position either way.
Electability has always been a hazy concept, as much about feelings as evidence and the imagined behavior of hypothetical swing voters. But Democrats chose Biden as their nominee four years ago because they thought he was the most electable. Now, the party is threatening to ditch Biden — the only person who has actually beaten Trump — because it is convinced he can’t win again and may take the rest of the party down with him.
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