The gaffe-prone dementia-laden president finally waved the white flag after being harassed by George Clooney, Nancy Pelosi and the rest of his so-called “friends,” ending his re-election campaign before Democrats could officially renominate him at their convention (even though he had won an overwhelming majority of delegates in the 2024 Democratic Party presidential primaries).

Biden insisted he’d finish out his term, then promptly handed the keys to Vice President Kamala Harris, who was effectively installed as the Democratic nominee without a competitive primary. Harris went on to lose the general election to Donald Trump, making the Democrats’ emergency swap one of the more memorable political gambles (and failures) in recent history.

The emergency substitution was billed as the party’s best chance to stop Donald Trump.
It didn’t. Trump returned to the White House and Democrats have spent the last two years debating whether Biden stayed in too long, whether Harris was the right choice, or whether party insiders should have allowed a truly competitive nomination battle instead.

Now comes the ironic part.

Despite losing in 2024, Harris remains one of the early favorites in polling of potential 2028 Democratic primary voters, even as a growing cast of ambitious Democrats circles the starting line.

Two years after Democrats replaced one nominee in hopes of changing the outcome, they may be preparing to ask voters to give the same losing replacement another chance. This time, there won’t be Donald Trump on the ballot – but Democrats may still be betting that the candidate who couldn’t win in 2024 can somehow win in 2028.