Dire Biden Straits

The president’s strong defense of Israel has him facing a rebellion to his left

U.S. President Joe Biden listens as Vice President Kamala Harris introduces him during an event about his administration's approach to artificial intelligence in the East Room of the White House on October 30, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

One year from today, we will be less than a week away from the general election of 2024.

At the moment, it looks very much like that contest will be a rematch of 2020, pitting the sitting president against the previous president—the first time that’s happened since the election of 1892, when Grover Cleveland defeated the incumbent president (Benjamin Harrison) who had beaten him four years earlier.

A couple of months ago, I made the case for Biden stepping aside in favor of a stronger Democratic candidate. In response (not just to me but also to the slew of other pundits who made similar arguments at the time), critics pointed out that any alternative Democrat would have negatives of his or her own and would lack the benefits of incumbency, making Biden better placed than anyone else to defeat Donald Trump.

Maybe. But the debate is now pointless. Biden isn’t dropping out. And Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips’ ridiculously late just-launched primary challenge to Biden isn’t going anywhere, and not only because former Republican consultant Steve Schmidt (the man who single-handedly convinced Phillips to run) has poor judgment. The most Phillips, a little-known Democrat who as of last January had voted with Biden 100 percent of the time, might be able to do is get Biden to track a little bit further to the right than he otherwise would.

That might sound savvy. Conventional wisdom holds that Democrats need to run right, and Republicans left, when heading into the general election in order to attract as many moderate, cross-pressured, independent voters in the center of the political spectrum as possible. I still think there’s truth to that, even in our moment of maximal polarization. The problem, though, is that, in addition to needing to persuade the independent voters who supported him in 2020 and have since drifted away to come home a year from now, Biden faces a problem just as dire on the left side of the party.

Left Out

The most ominous polling data for Biden in recent months came last week from Gallup. Over the past month, Biden’s approval has fallen four points among all voters, from 41 to 37 percent, and a grand total of 11 points, from 86 to 75 percent, among Democrats. That’s Biden’s lowest approval number from members of his own party since the start of his presidency, when he regularly enjoyed 90+ percent approval from Democrats.

Now, it’s possible this is just statistical noise or a fluke. Between November and December of 2021, Biden fell 12 points among Democrats, from 90 to 78 percent, for no discernable reason. Within a few months, he’d bounced back to the low-to-mid-80s. (Though he would never rise higher than 87 percent again.) So maybe he’ll recover somewhat.

Whether he does will depend, I think, on what happens in the Middle East over the coming days, weeks, and months. That’s because the simplest explanation for Biden’s drop in Democratic support is anger on the left about his steadfast support for Israel in the weeks since Hamas’ terrorist invasion of the country on October 7.

If that’s correct, the number could go lower, and possibly much lower—above all, because the Gallup poll was taken from October 2 – 23, which means the attack hadn’t happened yet when polling began, and sympathy for Israel was at a high point over the days following the first, horrific reports of the mass slaughter, rape, torture, and kidnapping of Israeli citizens. I suspect the 11-point drop mostly reflects sharply sinking sentiments toward the end of the three-week polling window, as Israel’s bombing of Gaza intensified and reports of Palestinian deaths grew more gruesome. Had the poll focused on October 16 – 23, the drop may well have been larger.

And what about next month? That will depend on what happens in the war. I have no idea if the views of the person who wrote the following tweet/post are representative in the country at large, but they are certainly prominent in my Twitter/X feed and on many university campuses.

If a portion of the Democratic electorate feels this way about Biden’s support for Israel and turns against him as a result, it won’t prevent him from winning the nomination. A Pew study from 2021 estimated that roughly 12 percent of the party can be described as “Progressive.” Those are the voters most likely to affirm this kind of a statement. Another 16 percent of the party, the “Outsider Left,” might include some others who are similarly disposed. Biden would still easily receive the nod from his party with defections of that size.

But could he win against Trump a year from now if such voters switch their allegiance to Cornel West, some other outspoken left-wing third-party challenger, or if they just opt stay home on Election Day 2024? Given that head-to-head polls currently show Trump and Biden in a dead heat, I’d say the answer is no. Which means Biden has a potentially fatal problem here.