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| Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay major presidential candidate |
Pete Buttigieg announced on Sunday evening, just two days before Super Tuesday, that he would be dropping out of the democratic primary race. This decision came following his poor performance in the South Carolina democratic primary, indicating his lack of popularity with African American voters.
Buttigieg said that it was "the right thing to do" and that he was concerned about the impact he would have on the race if he had not chosen to suspend his campaign. He stated that the democratic party needed to produce "the right kind of nominee" to run against Mr. Trump.
1. Do you agree with Buttigieg that dropping out of the race was "the right thing to do"? Why?
2. What are the main concerns for the Democratic Party at the moment? What traits should their nominee embody if they want to win the 2020 election against incumbent president Trump?
3. How will Buttigieg's withdrawal from the race affect future primary/caucus outcomes?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/01/us/politics/pete-buttigieg-drops-out.html
2. What are the main concerns for the Democratic Party at the moment? What traits should their nominee embody if they want to win the 2020 election against incumbent president Trump?
3. How will Buttigieg's withdrawal from the race affect future primary/caucus outcomes?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/01/us/politics/pete-buttigieg-drops-out.html
1. The answer to that question really depends on motivation. Some speculate that one of the leading candidates (Biden or Sanders) offered Buttigieg a VP position or even a strong Cabinet position in case he dropped out now; realizing that he'd be more likely to get a successful end result in that case, a.k.a. a Democrat in the White House, dropping out was the right thing to do. He could have also seen the poll results and that consistent third place wouldn't get him the nomination as his novelty wore off and a few individual states wouldn't shake up results. From a pragmatic perspective, getting in a more successful candidate's good graces now is a strong play.
ReplyDelete2. The main concern for the Democratic Party, at least in the context of 2020, is Trump. Nobody wants him to get a second term; how this is accomplished will be another question entirely. Some may still be scared from 2016, where some argued that if Sanders were the nominee he would have won, and in that case it's a good question whether to shoot down Sanders and pray Biden works out or let the people decide. Above all, whoever's on top must stand as an opposite to Trump: even if they're a populist, they must be the order to his chaos, a political veteran to his brash newcomer. Whatever attracts those who hesitantly voted for Trump in 2016, but had a change of heart, will be appreciated.
3. Given that he's endorsed Biden, I imagine more people will vote for Biden. If Warren eventually follows suit, there will be an interesting split where the far-left Democrats stick with Bernie and most of everyone else supporting Biden; the latter category will probably be greater in numbers. While some Buttigieg and Klobuchar supporters may prefer Sanders or Bloomberg, I don't see too many jumping ship to Sanders.
I believe that Buttigieg's decision was a reasonable action to prevent further funding for a lost cause. I think the main concern for the Democratic Party is the lack of a cohesive agenda and internal disagreement, which may cause some moderate Democrats to side with Trump rather than Sanders. In order to win against Trump, the Democrats need to find more common ground in their differing policies. Interestingly, since Buttigieg is, ideologically speaking, between Sanders/Warren and Biden/Bloomberg, he might find it difficult to endorse another up-and-running candidate. If, as Ryan mentioned, Buttigieg is offered a position as Vice President, it would definitely be more effective to simply drop out now. Nonetheless, I still think it is inspiring that an openly-gay mayor was able to work his way to one of the top leading presidential candidates.
ReplyDeleteI agree with all of the above. Buttigieg's withdrawal from the race is necessary to prevent another ticket split like the party did with Bernie and Hillary in 2016. The main thing the democrats absolutely need to do now is to take advantage of coronavirus panic if they want to stand a chance at winning. The recent stock plummets are an excellent counter to Trump's ability to run the economy, which is his main selling point. Future primaries will likely be more skewed towards Biden, as mentioned above, because more and more moderate candidates are beginning to drop out and are endorsing him.
ReplyDeleteI think it was very reasonable for Buttigieg to consider the position that he is in and consider how it could impact the future or the United States. He put his own values aside to ensure that the greater publics democratic values will ultimately be upheld. The biggest challenge for the democratic party would be Trump and how to win over his republican supporters, to do this democrats must develop a strong agenda. Buttigieg’s withdrawal will prompt his supporters to vote for their second choice and this could lead to a more a candidate getting an obvious amount of more votes.
ReplyDeleteI think that it was a reasonable decision for Buttigieg to prevent losing more money on a campaign that isn’t going to win. He understands that other democrats have similar values as he does and acknowledges that our country has a chance of changing for the better without him. I think the main concerns for the Democratic Party are achieving equality, closing the wealth gap, reforming student debt, acknowledging the climate crisis, gun reform, and of course figuring out the Coronavirus. Since Buttigieg endorsed Biden, I think that his supporters will cause Biden’s polls to surge.
ReplyDeleteThe main concern for the Democratic at this moment, I believe, is finding a candidate who can stand up to President Trump and take him down at the presidential election. As good as Buttigieg is, I think we can all agree that he is a very young politician, being 38, and he's still far away from being "the candidate" that will take out the President from the white house. Although as of now he's definitely not the best candidate out there, I'm confident to say that he's going to learn from this experience, being his first time running for president, and he'll also grow in popularity since he proved in the Iowa and New Hampshire that he can be a popular vote.
ReplyDeleteI do agree that dropping out of the race was the right decision because a big part of the Democratic race is electability, and right now Buttigieg does not have the name recognition or experience to beat Trump. A big concern for the Democratic party is finding someone who has bold policies and enough experience and name recognition to take down Trump. In addition, Buttigieg was unable to get votes from African Americans, a demographic the Democrats are going to need to beat Trump. Buttigieg's withdraw and his endorsement of Biden will lead to a boost in Bieden's voters as Biden is no longer competing with Buttigieg for votes and will get a lot of his supporters.
ReplyDeleteBoth Bloomberg and Buttigieg dropped out and supported Biden. Currently, Biden is in the lead with delegates with Bernie around 90 behind. I believe it was the best decision for the party to drop out and will prove beneficial in the long run. Warren has decided to stay in the race despite being super behind, but I appreciate her hustle. These ex-candidates who are supporting Biden will only increase the gap between him and Bernie I believe, endorsing a candidate brings many of the excandidate's supporters over to the endorsee. We'll see what happens in the future.
ReplyDeleteI think that it was the right thing to do for Pete to drop out because he barely had any support among the African American population and they are critical in winning the nomination and the general election because they are such an important part of the Democratic party. If there hasn't been a precedent already, his suspension of his campaign would reveal that if a candidate doesn't have enough African American support, they are not viable enough to keep going in the race. Something that I learned throughout this election cycle is how important the more diverse states are--the ones that are more reflective of the US population--because if those states can't be won, then the likelihood of the candidate winning the election, let alone the nomination, is very low. Pete's withdrawal showed how critical the early voting states are in deciding whether a candidate will keep going or not.
ReplyDeleteAs to whether or not dropping out of the race is “the right thing to do,” I am not really sure. While it is clear that he has no current path to the nomination, he can still use his supporters to influence other candidates into shifting their ideals more towards him. I believe that the main concern of the democratic party is that they feel that the base is too fragmented at the moment, so another candidate dropping out definitely makes them more united. The main goal of the democrats is to defeat Donald Trump in the election, so the more they can do to avoid a contested convention, the better. As for results in future primaries, I believe that it will help the more moderate democrats such as Amy Klobuchar or Joe Biden. This will most likely hurt Bernie’s campaign, as there are now less people splitting the moderate vote.
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