Democrats worry their most loyal voters won’t turn out for Biden in 2024
Summary:
Democrats are becoming increasingly concerned about a possible drop in Black voter turnout for the 2024 presidential election, according to party insiders. The worries arise from a 10% decrease in Black voter turnout in the 2022 midterms compared to 2018, a more substantial decline than any other racial or ethnic group, as per a Washington Post analysis. The decline was particularly significant among younger and male Black voters in crucial states like Georgia, where Democrats aim to mobilize Black voter support for President Biden in 2024.
The Democratic party has acknowledged the need to bolster their outreach efforts to this demographic. W. Mondale Robinson, founder of the Black Male Voter Project, highlighted the need for Democrats to refocus their attention on Black male voters, who have shown lower levels of engagement. In response, Biden's team has pledged to communicate more effectively about the benefits that the Black community has reaped under Biden's administration, according to Cedric L. Richmond, a senior advisor at the Democratic National Committee.
However, Black voter advocates have identified deep-seated issues affecting Black voter turnout. Many Black men reportedly feel detached from the political process and uninspired by both parties' policies. Terrance Woodbury, CEO of HIT Strategies, a polling firm, suggests that the Democratic party's focus on countering Trump and Republican extremism doesn't motivate younger Black men as much as arguments focused on policy benefits. Concerns are growing within the party that if they fail to address these issues, disenchanted Black voters might either abstain or, potentially, be swayed by Republican messaging on certain key issues.
Maybe... Maaaaaayyyyyyybeeeee the Democrats need to nominate someone who is actually worth getting excited about instead of just being not-Trump.
Because if voters are excited, they may start voting in primaries...
Every since Obama beat Clinton 15 years ago, party leaders seem more motivated to make sure their pick wins the primary than a Democrat winning the general.
"Moderates" seem ineffictive because they're not trying to just win, they're trying to win by as little as possible. Like a corrupt pro athlete who's not throwing the game, but trying to win by less than the spread.
They know the reason most people vote for moderates like Biden, is if they don't, someone like trump would win. It's just the party leaders would rather trade back and forth than let Dems like FDR win every election for decades.
Jesus I thought you were exaggerating and then I did the math
If you think that's bad:
Biden's first presidential primary was 35 years ago...
He was the expected front runner due mainly to his (at the time) exceptional public speaking but got caught plagiarizing speeches, lying about his grades in law school, and even people finding out he cheated while in law school by plagiarising papers.
But everyone forgot about all that because he spent 8 years standing next to Obama. And the only reason he got that job was to make old white people less uncomfortable voting for a Black guy.
That's a great way to put it. Both parties are funded by dark money interests, one drives us to the right and the other keeps us in place. This is described as the ratchet effect
and millions are claiming the democrats are radicals, little do they know that the country was more progressive on certain fronts 50 years ago. So they have to resort to blaming gays and trans, because everything else about the current staye of the country is kinda right-wingy to begin with.
Hell, Republicans 50 years ago were more progressive than the Dems are today.
Anyone "worth getting excited about" is going to challenge the status quo too much - even nominally - for the DNC to be okay with it. They are conservative in the descriptive sense. "No-one's standard of living will fundamentally change."
Sorry, the do-something machine is broke. Best we can do is partially fossilized C-Suite moderates.
Well, what if we put RFK Jr beside them, does that make them seem any better?
Well, now you're just being unreasonable.
Not being trump is enough for me. Sure, I’d love someone better. But I’d vote for a wooden brick if it meant america wouldn’t turn into a dictatorship.
Or maybe you need to understand that the down ticket races are more important than the presidency?
Change in the US starts at the bottom. Not the top.
Fuck the presidency. Just vote for the candidate that isn't going to burn the country down.
You want real change? Real progressivism? Vote progressives into local offices. Your young, progressive education board member today is your congressional rep tomorrow. Your congressional rep today is your presidential hopeful tomorrow.
Let the status quo dems toss whatever geriatric they want at the presidency and vote them in so we don't get another trump, or worse, a president desantis or something.
Presidents don't often push new laws anyway. You want to change the country? Help take the House and the Senate. As long as the president is the same party they're not going to veto progressive legislation.
I was about to write something like your comment.
Show up to every local election. Pay attention at the local level. Use your passion against the two party system to get third-party candidates elected to your state house.
This shit right here. Both times I was exited for a candidate he got thrown out because the party leaders didn't like him, first with Hillary, and then with Biden. I'm just going to continue to vote for not-trump because I know how bad it will be but I don't want any centrist democrat almost as much as I dont want trump.
Maybe… Maaaaaayyyyyyybeeeee the left voters need to actually show up to vote.
Now everyone is going to say they voted in a presidential election, possibly even a primary which makes them a rarity! Those aren't what we're talking about. The right has made it a point to vote on everything even as small as schoolboards so the only people voting in the tiny little races are the right wing rage crowd or the centrists who are being pulled to the right. Yes, the presidential vote matters, but frankly those lower down votes mean a lot more and if you watch how the Republican primaries are going, shows exactly how much power that batch that will show up has over a party.
I'm convinced he was picked because "it was his time"
I don’t think that was the main reason.
IMO, Biden was nominated because he was a fairly uncontroversial (by mainstream sensibilities anyway) white male candidate who also isn’t that attached to many positions that would threaten the powers that be.
Biden is a weather vane that swings in accordance to the winds. Which is all that was needed to beat a historically unpopular candidate like Trump. Thankfully, Trump is such a bad option that even Biden can be a palatable candidate.
Why this fossil didn’t bend the knee and allow another younger, more exciting candidate step up for 2024 is beyond me though. But I guess seeing the average age and mental capability of Congress, it shouldn’t be surprising. IMO, everyone over the age of 65 should be ineligible for elected office. They are at retirement age, and have no real, justifiable stake in the future. They should retire with the knowledge they won life and can live out the rest of their days in comfort and leave running the country to people who have skin in the game and the energy/mental faculties to actually play it.
Biden joining + everyone else dropping out was the last hope the establishment had to kneecap Bernie, and it fucking worked
That almost makes it sound like we live in an autocracy and not a democracy when the party picks who's running and not the voters...
Well they have argued in court on the public record that they owe their members no expectation of democracy.
You’ve been lied to your entire life that we live in a democracy. When people tell you this isn’t a democracy this is the reason why.
Biden won because black women liked him and they actually go out and vote in the primaries, unlike the louts in this thread who are literally talking about how they won’t vote.
I think that goes with him being uncontroversial. Black people in America are fairly conservative, and politically they like to go for people who can win that aren't too radical. Biden was that candidate.
Probably because the geriatrics fucked two whole generations of politicians by not stepping down when they should have.
Gen X and millennials don't have enough horses in the race with the experience necessary to run for president because they got fucked by the boomers.
We're going to be in for an exciting ride over the next two decades as something like 40% of Congress retires or dies in office without anyone with experience available to replace them.
And this is on both sides.
He won because they weren't going to allow Bernie Sanders to win
Or maybe grow up and realize that political offices and the people that fill them shouldn't be "exciting". Maybe the problem is that we all want someone exciting... With no regard for competence.
"I'd have a beer with him." Who gives a fuck???
From a non-US standpoint this is rather easy:
You have 2 geriatric options. Option 1 would lead to a dictatorship. Option 2 would lead to the - non-ideal - status quo.
How the fuck do you even have to think about which option would be better???
The Dems have ran non ideal status quo candidates for so long it becomes fatiguing so people stay home or write in Snoop Dogg.
While I totally understand the frustration - apathy cannot be a solution in this scenario!
You'd rather sit at home and watch your democracy go up in flames than just make an "x" on a piece of paper or a screen? Seriously, come on man...
Nothing in the comment to which you replied suggests that the commenter has given up. They merely describe what causes people to do so. At least as I read it.
Democracy is going up in flames either way, the question is whether we want it fast or slow. The only way to stop it is for the Dems to put up decent candidates who want to stop the slide, and thus far, they've declined to do so. So while yes, we should keep voting blue to slow the slide, we shouldn't be stupid enough to believe that doing so is enough to stop it.
non-ideal over violent civil war
this is not a tough decision, my friend
Exactly. I live in America and I can't believe the stupidity of some of these comments like "well because they're running Joe Biden I won't vote waaaah!" Ok, then enjoy your dictatorship? It culturally is the worst thing I hate about being here.
Because the dictatorship is a minor inconvenient side effect of their team winning.
This is exactly it.
Also:
..followed by endless rationalization and moving goalposts
The dictatorship is the end goal.
But if you don't consider Trump the absolute threat that he is, you just stay home. When I thought there was no way he'd win (2016) I didn't vote for Hilary because I hate her. I voted for Biden because the threat had become real.
Dems are correctly assessing that there are still people who see Trump as a clown show rather than a future dictator.
Easy is subjective. The choice is obvious but having to vote for someone you know doesn't represent most of us isn't easy. It's a hard thing that we have to do. Nobody is thinking about what option to vote for here. We're grieving the decision that's already been made for us because there's no acceptable alternative. But thanks for your contributions. It's always so very helpful when people that don't even live our lives roll up to state the obvious.
fuckin find a decent nominee then
In 2020 there were double digits dems in the primary...
In 2024 we're expected to believe the only choice is Biden or a Republican.
If you're pissed "there's no other nominee" be mad at the party leaders who aren't allowing a primary. And realize there's 100s of people qualified to run as a Dem
Double digit nominees...that all lost to Biden.
We gonna drag them up again? So they can lose again?
... That's what a primary is for. So people can, like, actually choose.
There are a LOT of people who don't want Biden for another four years. There are people who didn't like him, but have warmed up to him.
Would he win a primary? Yeah, probably, because of incumbent advantage.
But that should be for people to decide.
There were four primaries in 2020 where the contest had candidates other than Biden and Bernie running. Biden lost three of them.
46 primaries had no one under 70 running on either side.
You mean like one that already beat Trump once?
Maybe one that isn't older than average life expectancy already let alone after another term. Just an idea.
Cool, if that candidate showed up and won the Democratic primary in 2020 I would have voted for them. As things stand I'll go with the most viable one that's most likely to defeat fascism. That's the incumbent, Joe Biden. I don't care if he's elderly.
I mean, I agree. If I were from the US I would also be voting for Biden. But it's a really sad state of affairs there isn't a better option. The system is ridiculous.
As an American, I'll be the first to talk about the inadequacies in our electoral system, especially for President. However, I don't think the tradition of incumbents getting the 'benefit of the doubt' and skipping a primary are a problem. They also aren't part of the 'system', that is entirely the choice of the DNC. Presidents are limited to two 4 year terms, so why not run back-to-back? It works most of the time.
The rest of the system is fucked.
I always viewed Biden as the lemon I suck on to cleanse my palette between courses, now they want the lemon to be the whole damn meal.
Better than a shit in your mouth? I don't have to be excited to vote for a lemon but I sure as fuck will to avoid a mouth full of shit. Oh and the reality of what a republican pres will do to the environment.
Fuck this system, we could have Bernie instead but corporate money don't like that so we got our democracy adultered and only had Biden to choose from last time
Then maybe get a better candidate? I'm pretty sure most sane Americans will vote for anyone not Trump. It's not that hard, just use another candidate.....
Dems: best we can do is this incredibly old man, and this roided up nutjob. Good luck everybody!
If they got a better candidate, they would have to represent their constituents. Democrats don't want that. They want to ride high on Republican tax policies.
Unfortunately almost half of Americans are not sane.
You can't run on having people vote for you just to avoid voting in the enemy. You must get people to vote for you because they want you. One day, a broadly populist Reagan-like Republican candidate will re-appear and he will utterly destroy your country.
Loyal democrat, I will happily vote for Joe Biden.
Are they "loyal" because they have no other choice? There's your problem.
one of the biggest issues, in my humble and also arrogant opinion, is that no political party in any English-speaking country, represents any interests of anyone earning under 7 figures. Maybe even 8 figures, and they have 0 interest or motivation in changing that — despite the lip-service both main parties make for it.
Correct, but no one on the right is advocating for the working class while a decent amount of the left are pro union and pro worker.
Just because both candidates are bad choices does not mean they are equally as bad. The DNC & RNC decide who is the candidate, let's be real. Primaries are rigged, so we get "a shit sandwich vs a giant douche" as South Park put it so eloquently.
not to be too sophist about it - but while I agree party members care — the salient word in my above post is represent.
it doesn't matter if the captain doesn't want you to get shot if the general is telling the private to shoot you.
That tracks, with I think a couple exceptions on the left. As a whole, yes absolutely.
I might have misread what I perceived to be a false equivalency about both sides being equally bad though.
Like saying Louie CK and Cosby are the same thing because they both did sexual crimes
Same same, but different
It feels like a significant amount of the democratic party really do. There are a few that ruin it but most are behind minimum wage increases, green energy, taxing the rich, better education and health care. They need a majority not a tie
The few that ruin it dictate everything.
You'd better believe I'll turn out. I don't care if Biden is sometimes a disaster, I vote D to protect my LGBT friends. Accelerationism only hurts people
I'm 40+, but youngsters are probably thinking, 'Vote for old white guy #1 or old white guy #2, who cares, neither can relate.' I voted for Joe last time only because Bernie wasn't running. I'm thinking Marianne Williamson this time, though. I don't know if Joe will make it, and I definitely don't want Kamala as president. She put over 1,500 people in jail for marijuana violations and then laughed about it when she was asked if she ever smoked marijuana.
Anyone who actually thinks this way is so far off base it's unbelievable. Politics isn't a personality contest. It's ruthless, calculated pragmatism.
This is an incredibly privileged and out of touch opinion. The damage that Republican policies will inflict on this country is egregious and you're going to base your vote on the fact that Kamala put people in jail for weed? This isn't a game. This isn't a happy democracy where we show up and vote for our feelings. This is literally a calculated political exercise. Your attitude is dangerous and by NOT voting for harm-reducing policies you are contributing to a worse America.
Just curious, if Marianne doesn't get the Democratic nomination do you still plan on voting for the Democratic nominee?
Regardless of your feelings about Harris, (I have similar feelings) you must recognize that having her as president would be, by far, the lesser evil when compared to Trump especially if you're concerned about excessive imprisonment / decriminalization of marijuana.
I agree with you in principle, but please hold your nose and vote for Joe like I will be doing. Splitting the vote is how we'll end up with a second Trump presidency.
Forcing unliked or unwanted candidates is how the Dems lose elections. Dems absolutely are ass at primary voting.
Let’s show them…that we aren’t reliable voters and shouldn’t be their core of support
It's less about the race and age of the person and more about the politics. Bernie was "old white guy" but he excited young voters. They couldn't overcome the behemoth party machine and their big media buddies working hard to redirect voters.
Criminal justice is what got me political in the first place tbh. I can abide by your line on kamala. And I would love a female president.
Say, for the sake of the argument, there are only 2 viable candidates. Guy #1 wants to kill 1 million people and Guy #2 wants to kill 2 million people who do you vote for?
You vote for Guy #1. You flyer, donate, and campaign for Guy #1. If you vote for some 3rd party who can never win you aren't being brave or informed, you're literally doing nothing while Guy #2 tries to kill 2 million people.
We don't live in a happy, beautiful world where we have the privilege of picking the policies we want to enact. We have 2 choices and they are "bad" and "worse". This isn't about your feelings. This is about the actual impact that bad policy will have on millions and millions of Americans.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/harris
so while I'm sure this is a factor it really has to be pointed out that the media really wants to play shit up to keep the batshit GOP viable. It sells papers (clicks, whatever). The WaPo is bad, but when you look at NYT columns it really skews right in a weird and alarming way
Democrats have done a shit job at selling their victories as well as their vision for the country, as always.
Then come election time they are always wondering why aren't Democratic voters more excited to vote for them.
I am so sick of that same cycle repeating over and over again. Republicans voters are so adamant about getting their people in power that they will break the law and vote twice, and Dem voters aren't excited enough to even show up at the polls.
I also have to add that it's infuriating that the Dems are so splintered of a party that they consider black voters are their most loyal demographic. Nothing against them, but for fucks sakes guys at best black folks only represent 13% of the population. You can't win any elections even if you won every single black vote. They aren't even the largest minority group. Latinos represent just under 20% but many of them support the GOP. Dems need to stop turning their backs on some much larger demographic groups out there. Because they focus on just a few smaller groups, that's why they are always scrounging for votes even in elections that they should have in the bag. It is embarrassing how poorly run the Democratic party is, quite frankly.
As someone who voted Barr-Romney-Johnson-Biden I’m gonna be in the booth pissed I’m voting for Biden again considering the libertarians fully lost the plot and Republicans went full fascist with trump
I'm not going to turn out for Biden. Turns out Aussies are not allowed to vote in the U.S. elections. 🦘
not with that attitude
It’s only like 300k in donations and you too can participate in this dumpster fire
It's pretty obvious who to vote for considering Republicans are actively attacking our country. Sorry, I don't vote for terrorists.
God, they really think the problem is a lack of outreach and communication huh?
How about y'all fuckn listen?
Are you surprised?
Neoliberals want to run the country like a corporation, and they've been running the party like it was for decades. It's why the most important thing they care about is fundraising.
Whether they do anything or not once elected isn't something they're worried about. They just worry about how to keep getting donations.
So yeah. To them the biggest problem is outreach and communication
That's because candidates care about winning, and fundraising correlates to victory most of the time, (>70%.)
Because both parties care the most about fundraising, and they're the only two options...
If it's a good candidate, donations will follow. If all you care about is the donations, you're always going to fighting voter apathy.
Which is exactly what's been happening
Fundraising correlates to victory
Unfortunately I think this is everything running just as intended. They get to stay in power because the other guys are actually insane, and they don't actually have to do anything. What's the worst that can happen? The Republicans win? The rich (them) will just keep getting richer babyyy, just like always. And they provide democrats with really good campaign material, again, without actually having to do anything.
Well I'll be there, but it's just because I'd vote for a dead cat over anything the GOP will dredge up.
He was too old the first time, I'm surprised he made it this long. I was under the impression that their plan was to have biden die during his term so kamala became the first woman president.
"... Their plan was to have Biden die...."
Can you hear yourself? That's f'ng crazy.
My dad said the same shit. He got it from his Facebook echo chamber. Except they called her was gross names.
I dont think theyre plan was to outright let him die during the presidency, but I did think they would bust out the 25th amendment at least a year ago to put Kamala in charge
Also, Kamala is a pretty bad choice too due to her record as a district attorney. I still can't believe the Democrats ran with her despite police reform being such a huge issue in 2020
Democrats only lose if the Democrats beat themselves. And they seem to be trying to do that.
Legalize Cannabis and stop robbing black males of the right to vote.
You mean what republicans are doing extremely consistently?
Funny given I'm only a democratic voter because socialist isn't a viable option where I live, yet I absolutely vote Democrat 99% of the time when it's an option.
For those unaware, most smaller offices the opposition party won't even bother with a candidate. By and large, Republicans have no chance in sense cities (like Chicago or NYC) and Democrats have no chance in just about anywhere rural.
Democrats are doing very well in just about all rural areas of New England.
New England is obviously different culturally than many other areas of the US, but Dems could definitely take some valuable lessons from that area.
That's because New England's rural is like everywhere else's (in the US at least) suburban...
I've experienced a infinitesimal fraction of the bullshit, and empathize with the disillusionment. The system is dying. Trump did his damage already. That and worse are inevitable. Money in politics. Money in all of it, i mean you have people being locked up in the name of corporate, and ecobomic interest ffs. I vote in all the elections especially local because that can help shift police behavior for the better of day to day people. I didn't always vote. When trump first won I was listening on a broken wireless am radio in a shitty apt with no power or food in absolute wonder at the depravity of man and the meaning of it all for me... I didn't vote that year. Fuck me right? I didn't even know where the polls were. The people not voting are the ones pushing boundaries IMHO. What we are opposed to is the ruling class. The dnc bootlickers and fascists alike can get fucked.
Wed need the second coming of Jesus to save this version of "democracy" ffs.
There zero chance democrats dont show up if trumps on the ballot nobody is better at energizing the democrats base than trump
Trump on the ballot was what got me to vote. I've never really been jazzed enough to vote for someone, but I was sure angry enough to vote against.
I was just talking to a family member, and I was saying that I hope that it is trump. If the Republicans could put together any other non-controversial opponent, that person would destroy Biden in an election. Of course, I was happy that trump was running against Hillary as I thought he was the only opponent she could probably beat, so my prognostication skills are pretty shitty.
Too bad the DNC is such a corporate shithole that they are unable to back any strong progressives.
It's almost like he made a bunch of promises and then the democrats deliberate self-sabotaged so that they wouldn't have to actually fufil them.
What's that, we can't fix the senate because the parliamentarian said so? I guess the filibuster is insurmountable then. It certainly isn't like we can just ignore or replace said parlimentarian.
What's that, rather than using the clear and unambiguous means of forgiving student debt, we're going to use a method that the Republicans can easily block with a lawsuit that goes to their bought-and-paid-for Supreme Court? Guess you're stuck in debtor's hell forever.
Campaign on worker and union rights but then pass laws to force the railroad workers back to work without striking and without any rights.
Republicans are traitors and Democrats are nigh-on useless, and they wonder why voter turnout looks grim.
Of course it’s a conspiracy and not that there was a 50/50 tie in the Senate, which meant you needed 100% support from every Dem Senator, including a guy from a super conservative state who is looking out for his own political future. Obviously if they couldn’t make sweeping changes then it has to be because that’s their master plan, and we shouldn’t bother trying to get an actual solid majority into Congress
I've said this before, but I'll say it again. He is doing (some) good shit, Dems are just shit at PR.
The Union Busting was a bad look, all around. No one can dispute that. It left a (rightfully) bad taste in the mouths of the working class. The Biden Administration publicly showed that it does not support Labor Rights when push came to shove.
But, the Biden Administration did end up putting continuous pressure on the railroads to earn said paid sick days for the rail workers
No one is fucking talking about it though (I myself just learned about it a week ago), because again, Dems are fucking awful at PR. And it's going to hurt them in the election.
I'm starting to truly question whether or not it's on purpose that they're so quiet about certain stuff that they do, especially when it's to their own detriment.
Because it's the bare minimum and they wish to avoid probing questions about why they won't do more.
Democrats have zero passion. They always stuck with status quo, so the only reason to vote for them is because they're still susceptible to shame and are willing to eat their own to keep a veneer of respectability. Remember in the US there's a far-right party and a center-right party. The US is dying a very slow, painful death while its population bickers about beer and Barbie.
Some people are downvoting you, but you summed it up exactly as it is.
First of all, I don't even understand the mindset of someone who doesn't vote. So you don't really like any of the candidates, so what? Vote for the least worst option or the actual worst option could win (see: 2016).
Second, to be fair, any party could try running someone who's less than a million years old. American politics are so bizarre this way. Canada's current PM was 43 when he was elected and still more than 30 years younger than America's current president. Parliament is populated largely by middle agers and a few younger members, whereas congress is a sea of bald and gray, pockmarked by a small handful of 40 somethings? Shit is ridiculous.
Privilege.
Not them tho, you. Your privilege is why you can't understand it.
Some people have to wait 8 hours in line while taking a day off work without pay. All for someone whose not going to actually help them. Their choice is "things get obviously worse for me" and "things get worse for me, but slower and no one talks about it".
We could try actually following thru with campaign promises and helping them, but for some reason we dont. Once elected all the Dem presidents in the last 3-4 decades immediately start telling us their campaign promises are obviously impossible so they're just not going to really try.
Even Obamacare was just Mitt Romney's plan by the time it happened.
Personally tho, it takes less than an hour for me to vote and I get a paid half day from work to do so. So I always vote.
That doesn't mean I assume it's as easy for everyone else
Are you determined to not have allies of any kind?
I get that your state is fucked, but as a resident of one of the other 49 states, my options to help are limited as long as we lack one of the the chambers of Congress since the gop is literally the problem here.
That would be because we don't have control of the House. It's difficult to get work done when the side in control of the button that stops everything from working sits on the fucking button while shrieking racist epitaphs at the top of their lungs.
Isn't "things get worse slower" better than "things get worse right away?" What happened to pragmatism? If things get worse slower, there's a chance to stop them in the future.
In a lot of areas voting isn't easy. It's something you have to work to do. Why stand in the freezing November air worried you're gonna be late for work and lose your job if you're not excited? Why do it in the morning? Because maybe you're me in your 20s and don't have a car and you can actually make it to when the polls open in the morning but not the evening with how the schedules run.
Why go up to the election office and force them to take your mail in ballet after it was rejected twice because your signature "didn't match" if you're not excited?
Why finagle a time in your day when you can stand in the cold for an hour without your baby if you're not excited?
Why stand until you want to literally because the line was way longer than you thought it was and you didn't bring a chair this time if you're not excited?
All this happened to me over the course of me voting in my adult life. This doesn't count how voting locations constantly move on me for reasons unknown. It's not that the voting location moved. For some reason I was just assigned a different location. The times where I've been given the run around about where I should vote. The times where I tried to vote, but whoops all the machines are broken and I decided that I didn't want to wait for a repair which could take hours.
Voting is hard. It can be a breezy affair, but I've never experienced that in presidential elections or midterms, only really in special state elections or pure local elections. The system is definitely rigged against you and you have to ask yourself if it's worth fighting. Is denying my kid's time with me worth this? Is enduring this strain on my body worth this? Is the mental energy when I'm tired from work worth this? I get what you'd say no even if I always say yes
Oh yeah, that's another thing. For something that's supposed to be a sacred right, voting is made absurdly difficult in the US.
In Canada, employers are legally obligated give up to three hours PTO to vote. There are usually two or three advance polls if election day doesn't work for you. Every podunk town in the country has a polling station setup. Basically every form of ID imaginable is accepted. You can register to vote by mail online weeks before an election, receive your ballot and return it in the included prepaid envelope.
Elections Canada bends over backwards to give everyone the opportunity to vote. But it's like America doesn't actually want people to vote at all.
I don't cross picket lines, why would I vote for a union buster? Balk all you want but that's my hard line. Already listed out the local reps I can't vote for because of the same reason. Y'all can bend your beliefs however you want to justify feedin into the same old cycle but I told them this was my hard line and they crossed it. Fuck them.
If Trump is elected do you think that his administration would be more friendly to unions than the Biden administration?
If you're mad about Biden forcibly ending the rail strike (which was honestly infuriating) you should know that his administration continued to work with the labor union afterward to negotiate a deal while also avoiding a disastrous economic shutdown that would have resulted from the strike. Could Biden have done more to get a deal without forcing an end to the strike? Maybe. Should he have let the economy collapse in order to support labor rights? Maybe, but I understand why he didn't.
Biden was basically my last choice of the field of democrats running in 2020 but I don't know what anyone else would have done to achieve better results.
I don't disagree with most of what you said but there's a real basic thing with the rail strike he could've done.
If the government has the power to force a deal, he could've just given the workers the week off they asked for, forcing the companies to acquiesce instead of the people.
The federal government (executive branch) government did not have the power to force a deal. It had the power to break a strike
Congress had the power to enforce the agreement as written, but could not pass a bill to do so.
https://uniontrack.com/blog/rail-unions
Honestly given the way elections work I'm the us this is a pretty shit line of reasoning
Trump is a union buster and more
Not voting democrat is a direct vote for fascism. Just because it's not ideal and not fair doesn't make it any less true.
It's always ideal for people who say this.
This is a very privileged position to take. Certain demographics in our country are facing genocide at the hands of one party.
"Same old cycle" is right wing propaganda. Biden is by far the most progressive president we've ever had.
Should have thought of that at least 2 years ago.
About two years ago the White House was signing off on proposals from the city of Memphis to spend tens of millions of dollars of COVID money on police officers, which is one of the ways federal taxpayer money got put into the pockets of the people who beat Tyre Nichols to death
Because he's over a decade past senior citizen.
Who the fuck do you think your constituents are? All retired senior citizens?
If a 35 year old was running, I'd vote for them literally for the age alone, providing there were no fascism ties.
We need to stop electing people that have not worked a job in over 60 years. It's a fucking joke.
I will vote for anyone under 40. I will NEVER vote for a senior citizen.
Fuck this bullshit.
Mother fucker if Biden is the not-Trump option then you better vote for his senior citizen ass. Elections have consequences. Be idealistic in the primary but for fucks sake vote logically on election day.
Staying home or voting 3rd part/write in is a vote for Trump and is indirect violence against your fellow citizens and others around the world. How many more people would be alive today if we didn't have Trump purposely providing bad COVID information?
Lives are literally at stake. Hold your nose and pull the correct lever. It's simple harm reduction.
The maybe they should let us, I don't know, vote in a primary election for the person we want to run as the Democrat nominee?? Just forcing Biden on us, like wtf?
Remember Bernie, both times?
Well, like someone else said, vote for Bernie or whoever you like in the primaries, then go cast your anti-Trump vote on election day. If Trump gets back in you'll never get the opportunity to vote in a real presidential election again.
I think part of the reason why people feel they don't have a choice is because the DNC seems to have just chosen biden instead of letting any other democratic candidate have a chance at the nominee.
Then you’re helping to elect Trump. Simple as that.
I think it’s a losing message to campaign on “everything is fine” when the vast majority of Americans are struggling.
Breaking Points covered this article and highlights that the current expectation is to simply say “we’re better than trump”. I don’t think this is very effective and believe that only an economic message can sway voters.
I’m sorry to bring up Reddit, but being interested in US politics (I’m not from the US) I’m impressed with the level of discussion here.
Almost every political reddit comment section I’ve encountered was a cesspool of such polarized left vs right opinions that anything more nuanced and centered was buried right away.
I feel like that's the problem in almost any political debate among people in the US. Everything is so polarizing. It always seems like it's a "you're either with us or against us". And you can't even discuss something you're unaware of without some know-it-all jackals jumping down your throat with political rage.
Incumbents historically win reelection more often than not, and the election hasn't started properly yet.
They didn't turn out in the midterms because Trump wasn't on the ballot.
Give people the option of 4 more years of Biden or going back to Trump, they'll turn out. I'm not concerned about that.
I'm more concerned about congress
Oh look - election season has officially kicked off with the DNC's first attempt at trying to guilt trip people into voting for their shitty candidate.
Expect many MANY more of these in the months to come.
It really takes a special kind of scumbag to decide that the proper strategy is to nominate a dismally corrupt and/or incompetent sack of shit then try to guilt trip people into voting for them and blame the voters if they lose, when they could just nominate a decent candidate and people would willingly and even eagerly vote for them and they'd win easily.
I sometimes wonder what it's like to be that entirely devoid of principles or integrity.
I imagine it involves a lot of alcohol.
Nobody needs to initiate any type of guilt trip. We've all been through 4 years of Trump. We currently are (finally) starting to see the indictments that wrought.
We have seen what DeSantis has done to Florida. Where, just today, they effectively outlawed AP Psychology for high school students. State-level brain drain, and trans genocide.
There's no option here and you're a piece of shit if you don't vote, or if you vote for the party that is literally an organized crime syndicate at this point, with a candidate who literally (and I mean like literally literally) should be in prison right now.
If you still need to be guilt tripped in order to make the right choice, then it sounds like you're kind of a piece of shit.
If people don't vote for Biden they are voting for the end of the US and democracy around the globe.
They are tired of being promised 40 acres and only given lip service. The DNC uses minorities as political pawns to be used and tossed aside the day after election and minority communities have caught on. Hopefully they will turn out in huge numbers to support Cornel West. Someone that offers the same rhetoric and policy Bernie did without being a party sheepdog.
Cornell West, who's campaign is being run by Jill "lunch with Putin" Stein. I thought more of West than to be an obvious Republican plant. I don't even care what I think about Biden, he is the incumbent president and will be the candidate. I'll vote for him in a second because the alternative is literally the likely destruction of the United States as we know it.
This isn't hard. The US is a two party system right now. I don't understand why people think a third party is ever a good idea right now. Maybe third parties should run in local elections instead of this dumb spoiler candidate for the president vs
The thing is that there's never a "good time" to vote third party because we're locked in to a forever crisis. And if you think the democrats will fix it, I think that you're mistaken. IMO, the democrats haven't been serious about fixing stuff basically since Johnson. Carter had a lot of good ideas, but his legacy as president is basically "that guy where gas prices started going up"; Clinton did address some problems (like the deficit), which got the republicans big mad, but failed to address a bunch of other serious issues that would have been much less painful to solve in the 90s; Obama's basically the same way, only two wars kept him from even dreaming of a balanced budget. The democrats basically just stop making things actively worse for a little bit. Sometimes I wonder if this is what it was like to live through the demise of the Roman republic; Caesar is coming, our democracy is floundering and ineffectual, and the best that we've got is to shrug and vote for "not a Nazi". Don't get me wrong: never, ever vote for the Nazi, but come on, we have got to do better than that or things or going to keep getting a lot worse.
I want more candidates like Cornel West.
I am excited to vote. Maybe another candidate can catch my attention too.... please? The one party system outside of swing states is boring. Biden was a not Trump vote which is also boring. We can do better than the current voting arrangement.
Wait, Cornell West is running?
As a third party, which will just split the liberal/centrist vote.
As a third party candidate, which is useful presuming one wants to split the left.
You shouldn’t be allowed to hold office if you’re over 50. Find someone under 50 and people might get excited.
I’m sick and tired of this gerontocracy. It’s always been pasty faced old men running the show. They readily sell out everyone’s futures because they won’t be there to face the consequences.
Presidents have to be at least 35 according to the Constitution. I don't know that limiting the presidency to a 15-year age window is the best plan either.
If Republicans magically sweeten up on Tim Scott, that's going to be hella bad. We'll be energy independent as bee's homes melt and with a dude significantly more partial to racists than anyone that's black should be.
I have a suspicion that Tim Scott, if given full up-close magnification as a front runner, would creep people out with his unmarried, maybe-a-virgin, obvious Christian closet-case routine.
Refusing to be who you are, and instead allying yourself with the very people who hate who you really are, is some Stockholm shit by way of South Carolina.
That link is weird. Honeybees are not native to Arizona; they're an introduced species from Europe and Africa. There are native bees, but they don't build nests of easily meltable wax.
https://www.pollinator.org/pollinator.org/assets/generalFiles/AZ_bee_guide_FINAL.pdf
I was told that Biden was the more electable candidate. If this was the case this shouldn’t be an issue right?
Young black guy here (mid 20s), I'll be voting for Biden. Recently changed my party affiliation from Independent to Democrat.
Voting is easy. Read this document to the end. https://apps.npr.org/documents/document.html?id=23894046-us-v-trump-23-c
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Democrats are worried about a potential drop next year in turnout among Black voters, the party’s most loyal constituency, who played a consequential role in delivering the White House to President Biden in 2020 and will be crucial in his bid for reelection.
Such warning signals were initially papered over by other Democratic successes in 2022: The party picked up a U.S. Senate seat in Pennsylvania, Sen. Raphael G. Warnock won reelection in Georgia and anticipated losses in the House were minimal.
Advocates expect that trend to continue, particularly with Vice President Harris on the ticket and the appointment of Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who both made history as the first Black women in their roles.
Williams acknowledged any growth in support among Black voters could be harder for the GOP if Trump is the nominee — and there will be many other groups, including suburban White women, that the party will have to worry about in that case.
In Detroit, liberal organizers targeting Black turnout have made education about how politics work a centerpiece of their pitch, along with concrete examples of policies that have benefited people from state and federal legislation.
“There is a slow leaking of Black men from the base because the issues that they care about aren’t being addressed,” said Branden Snyder, executive director of Detroit Action, whose organizers tell people the exercise is more like writing a Yelp review to spur change.
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