by Frank Holmes, reporter
An independent-minded Democratic congressman openly called for Joe Biden to step aside as the party’s presidential candidate in 2024.
Now, he’s facing massive backlash from leaders in his own party, who threaten to dump him from his leadership position if he doesn’t stop speaking the truth about the president.
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Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Minn., has said Biden is too unpopular to run again. In Phillips’ view, Biden risks blowing the 2024 election to any Republican, including President Donald Trump.
Phillips has pointed out that Biden is trailing Trump by as much as seven points in recent polls, even after liberal prosecutors slapped Trump with multiple criminal charges.
When a reporter asked Phillips to answer directly whether he believes Joe Biden should run for a second term as president, Phillips replied, “No, I don’t.”
Earlier this month, Phillips told “Meet the Press” that he would like a sitting Democratic governor like Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Tim Walz of Minnesota, Tony Evers of Wisconsin, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, or J.B. Pritzker of Illinois to throw a hat in the ring against the incumbent president and his vice president, Kamala Harris.
“I’m actively inviting, encouraging — to some degree, imploring — that people who are ready and know it’s probably time to do so, take the chance,” Phillips said.
He even threatened to get into the race himself if no one else had the guts to do it. “If, and only if, the president doesn’t pass the torch, if his numbers continue to look like they do right now, and nobody is willing to be an alternative, then I will be making a really important decision,” said Phillips, adding, “I have not made that (decision) yet.”
The centrist-leaning Democrat said the party establishment has lined up for a “coronation” of Biden in 2024—and to make matters worse for the DNC, Phillips laid all their party’s dirty laundry out in one of the leading publications of the ruling class, The Atlantic.
“Believe me, there are literally hundreds in Congress who would say the same thing. But they simply won’t f***ing say a word,” Phillips reportedly wrote.
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Phillips is far from alone. Even now, 50 percent of Democrats want someone other than Joe Biden to be their nominee in 2024, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll released August 1.
Half of the Democratic primary voters agreed that “the party should nominate a different candidate for president in 2024.”
His two longshot Democratic challengers, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Marianne Williamson, are polling at 19 percent against him with 100 percent negative media coverage.
Phillips wants someone to step in and save his party from the Biden family ego.
“I would like to see Joe Biden, a wonderful and remarkable man, pass the torch” and “cement this extraordinary legacy,” Phillips said on Meet the Press.
Democrat Rep. Dean Phillips says he wants a Democrat governor — like Gretchen Whitmer, Tim Walz, Tony Evers, or J.B. Pritzker — to challenge Biden pic.twitter.com/cU66psV2ov
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) August 13, 2023
It looks like Phillips is feeling the heat from his the torch-passing comment… and he’s about to get burned.
The Democratic leader in the House of Representatives let Phillips know if he didn’t stop speaking the truth about the president, he could lose his leadership position.
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Phillips is the co-chair of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee (DPCC)—for now.
But House Democrat Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., has scheduled a meeting to get Phillips to hush his critiques of the president, his office announced publicly—a major slap in the face to the 54-year-old Phillips.
Jeffries believes “Joe Biden has been a transformational president” and “strongly supports his candidacy,” said his spokesperson, Christie Stephenson. “Dean Phillips was independently elected to a leadership position in the House Democratic Caucus. He is ultimately accountable to his House colleagues, who have not been bashful in sharing their views.”
The New York Democrat “intends to do everything in his power to make sure that President Biden is re-elected to a second term,” the spokesperson warned.
Democratic leaders in his own state also cracked down on the upstart congressman. “I really strongly believe that the only thing that his comments could do right now is hurt our chances to win,” Minnesota Democratic Farm-Labor Party Chairman Ken Martin said in an interview.
It looks like Phillips got the message: He’s all but dropped his presidential bid.
Running in the 2024 Democratic presidential primaries “is not something as of today that I see happening for a number of reasons,” Phillips told the Minneapolis Star Tribune over the weekend. “I will do everything I can to ensure he is re-elected despite my concerns,” he said.
Phillips changed his tune faster than Biden shifts gears in his Corvette.
As recently as a few weeks ago, one Democratic source in Minnesota told The Hill that Phillips “is talking to folks” about a possible 2024 presidential bid… and planned to talk to donors in New York City.
But Phillips has been off the party reservation for some time—and Democratic leaders’ patience with his has been wearing thin.
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In April, Phillips agreed with calls for doddering 90-year-old Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., to resign from her seat after years of clear signs that she’s losing her memory.
Being in Congress is a hard enough job when you’re physically fit, let alone “infirm, and clearly losing mental acuity” like Feinstein, Phillips said. “She is in no position to fulfill the duties of this job.” He wrote that Feinstein “risks tarnishing her remarkable legacy by staying in office,” in an article for the liberal Daily Beast.
Democratic Senator Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., lobbied hard for Feinstein to return to the Senate after an extended absence, so she could rubber-stamp left-wing judges who come before her committee.
At times, her staffers can be seen telling her to “just say aye.”
Maybe that’s what Democratic Party does with Biden, too.
Frank Holmes is a veteran journalist and an outspoken conservative that talks about the news that was in his weekly article, “On The Holmes Front.”