Could Democrats Choose A New Presidential Candidate?

Editor's note: This article does not reflect the opinions or views of Johns Hopkins University.

The Democratic Party's rules for its national convention in Chicago next month clearly provide a path for selecting a candidate to replace President Joe Biden as the party's nominee to run in the Nov. 5 election against Donald Trump, according to a New York Times essay by Johns Hopkins University political science professor Daniel Schlozman.

Democrats, Schlozman writes, "need to grasp a critical point: Joe Biden is not yet the nominee of the Democratic Pary."

The path to selecting an alternative nominee at the Democratic Party National Convention that starts Aug. 19 "remains open," he writes. "And a look at party rules, and the reasons for their adoption, offers a road map to how such a shift could happen."

A convention is not supposed to be a "coronation," Schlozman writes. "The point of a nomination process is to choose the best nominee for November."

The 3,934 delegates who are pledged to Biden based on the results of Democratic Party primary elections are not "bound" to cast their convention votes to nominate the president. The delegates and party leaders "are there to protect the party's broader interests rather than the narrow interests of any single candidate."

Schlozman quotes the party's charter, which states, "The national convention shall be the highest authority of the Democratic Party."

"Under party rules," he writes, "a nominee must win an absolute majority of delegates on a given presidential ballot at the convention. Now, with democracy in the balance, the convention can return to its old role of actually choosing the nominee. The party can still decide."

Schlozman also explains how the convention will also feature 739 "superdelegates," who are party leaders and elected officials who will "have to suffer the consequences if a flawed nominee drags down the ticket."

"They are there to protect the party's broader interests rather than the narrow interests of any single candidate," Schlozman writes. "If needed, the convention can work its will, and Democrats can still control their destiny. Country and party now require the delegates to use the power that is theirs."