VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Local political analyst Joel Rubin has lived through the upheaval and assassinations of 1968, the smoking gun Watergate tapes of 1974, and the hanging chads of 2000. He said President Joe Biden’s decision to drop out of the race for a second term is in the same league.
Biden’s move is just the latest development in a campaign season that has seen a debate debacle, an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump and leading voices in a president’s party telling him to get out.
And that was just the last four weeks.
Rubin said the issue of age and mental acuity will remain central to the presidential race, but now it has been flipped on its head.
“Trump is now the oldest person ever nominated to run for president by a major party,” Rubin said in a Monday interview less than 24 hours after Biden posted his withdrawal on X. “Their whole campaign was Biden is too old, showing the pictures of him stumbling down the steps of Air Force One. Now all of a sudden, Harris can use that on Trump.”
Rubin said to buckle up for the next 15 weeks. It’ll be a turbulent political season, the likes of which we rarely see.
“[The year] 2000 was crazy because it came down to a handful of votes in Florida and went to the Supreme Court,” Rubin said. “But it was being handled somewhat civilly by [Al] Gore and Bush. Trump is the wild card here. You just don’t know how things are going to go.”
As a likely nominee who would be historic, Harris will attract more voters from two key blocs — minorities and women.
“They were losing them in droves because Biden wouldn’t get out,” Rubin said. “Now, all of a sudden, it’s anybody’s game.”
Rubin said he’s impressed with how quickly Democrats have coalesced.
“What you saw on Sunday afternoon was unbelievable,” Rubin said. “I thought maybe they’d have a a mini-primary or something online, or let it happen at the convention, and there would be [an effort to consider other possible candidates]. I thought all that would happen the moment that Biden resigned. It didn’t. They all came together.”
Rubin said this will help down-ballot Democratic candidates such as Missy Cotter Smasal in her campaign to unseat Republican Jen Kiggans in Virginia’s Second Congressional District.
“I think they are thrilled because they were worried about inviting Biden in to campaign with them,” Rubin said. “Now they are to be happy to have either Kamala Harris or her vice presidential nominee.”
Rubin expects the energy to supercharge the Democratic convention in Chicago four short weeks from now, and he sees that platform as vital to Harris.
“Biden has done the patriotic thing by stepping away,” he said. “He is going to be lauded at the Democratic convention next month, closer to the election, and Harris will have an opportunity to give the speech of her life.”
Rubin said that, of the possibilities he has heard of for Harris’s running mate, Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania or Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina make the most sense.
He expects that immigration will be a major issue and a vulnerable point for Harris because Biden made her the immigration czar.
