Democratic leaders in Ohio are backing Vice President Kamala Harris to succeed President Joe Biden as their presidential running mate, but some Republicans say Democrats are being “unfair.”
“Our President Joe Biden is fighting for the American people, and we are deeply, deeply grateful for his service to our country,” Harris said in her first speech since the president dropped his re-election bid.
But the time has come for a up-to-date Democratic leader.
“We can finally breathe a sigh of relief and know that we are all moving forward,” said state Rep. Juanita Brent, D-Cleveland.
After Biden ended his campaign on Sunday, Ohio House of Representatives leaders like Rep. Juanita Brent are backing Harris as the up-to-date nominee.
“We have an opportunity to support the first black woman to become a major candidate in our party that is seriously considered by the public,” said Brent, vice chair of the Ohio Legislative Black Caucus.
Her view is also shared by House Minority Leader Allison Russo, a Democrat from Upper Arlington, and Senate Minority Leader Nickie Antonio, a Democrat from Lakewood.
“I’m excited about her candidacy,” Russo said. “I think she’s going to bring some energy to this campaign, especially for young voters, for voters in a lot of our communities. I’m excited about how united Democrats have become in the last 24 hours.”
Antonio posted a photo with Harris on social media and captioned it simply: “I said Kamala!”
But some Republicans, like state Rep. Adam Bird, R-New Richmond, say it is not fair to Ohioans and Americans who voted for Biden in the March primary.
“They are the ones who are disenfranchising millions and millions of voters, devaluing their votes and taking him down,” Bird said. “This is a coup from the left to take down their candidate.”
He thinks Democrats are hypocrites.
“The left keeps shouting, ‘Oh, democracy is under attack,’ and ‘President Trump is going to attack democracy,’” he said. “But they didn’t do the will of the people who voted for them. [Biden]…It is undemocratic.”
State Rep. Josh Williams, R-Sylvania, feels the same way and urges the party to leisurely down and listen to citizens.
“It’s undemocratic for the Democratic Party to just have a person hand-picked by the elites, by the donors,” Williams said. “Have a few town halls before the convention, and then your top three, your top four, go to the convention, give speeches.”
In a speech Monday in his hometown of Middletown, a city of 50,000 between Cincinnati and Dayton, Republican vice presidential candidate and U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance said the Democratic leadership is “corrupt.”
“Our whole system is you have to convince voters, you have to win their votes,” Vance said. “You don’t decide who’s going to be president in smoke-filled rooms with billionaires and high-ranking officials.”
As Brent said, no one has officially selected Harris yet.
Democratic delegate coordinator State Sen. Bill DeMora, D-Columbus, argued that Republicans are unaware of the DNC’s rules, which differ from those of the RNC.
“With Joe Biden withdrawing, all delegates are technically free agents and can now vote for whoever they think is best,” DeMora said. “It’s an open convention because no one is required to vote.”
As Williams said, it’s not so much about legal issues as the idea of conducting fair elections.
“This is not a Democratic process, this is not a primary election where voters listen to debates, go to the polls and decide for themselves who they want as their candidate,” the Republican added.
We went out to talk to voters in Cleveland and Columbus, Democratic strongholds. Every voter told us they either supported Harris or “didn’t care” as long as the individual could “beat Trump.”
The most cautious person we spoke to, Ken Kuehls of northeastern Ohio, still supported the party.
“I’m not sure our next election will be any good, but I have to decide, right?” Kuehls said.
Some Statehouse Democrats say the GOP is simply irate that Harris poses a bigger threat to Trump than Biden. Bird has denied that.
“Morgan, it’s because they knew for the last 3 1/2 years that he was not mentally and physically capable of doing this job — they knew it the whole time, and yet they put him in the primary knowing he couldn’t do it,” Bird said, adding that he was an incumbent, and no one could run against an incumbent. “Then, when their polls show that he can’t beat Donald Trump, they’re desperately looking for another way to squeeze out a victory when they’re about to lose.”
This is fraud, Williams argued.
“We were called the ones who tried to be totalitarian dictators,” Williams said. “Now we’re looking at a party that can hand-pick its successors. Tell me how that looks.”
None of the Democrats we spoke to in the last 24 hours were concerned about the accusations from the Republican Party.
“We can just focus on uniting before the DNC convention and uniting around one candidate so we can defeat Trump and JD Vance in November,” Brent said.
DeMora was amused and took time to insult both Trump and Vance.
“Whoever our nominee is, whether it’s vice president or whoever comes out of this process, is a much better candidate,” DeMora said. “These are not criminals, these are coherent public servants who will serve the citizens of the United States honorably and legally.”
He said it was ridiculous for Ohio Republicans to complain that Democrats were anti-democratic.
“We have the most corrupt state Capitol in the United States,” DeMora said, citing Republican leaders who sold the state Capitol in exchange for bribery legislation for which citizens still pay.
Ohio Democrats have previously claimed that state Republicans are opposed to democracy for the following reasons: they are opposed to the will of the voters on their anti-gerrymandering reform bill, they are opposed to the bipartisan Ohio Supreme Court striking down said gerrymandered district maps seven times, they are trying to undermine the people’s vote on abortion, marijuana, and voting access (special elections designed to make it harder to change the Constitution), they have failed to pass constitutional muster on public school funding for decades, and a seemingly endless list of other fights that Democrats have lost time and time again (they claim it’s because the district maps are gerrymandered).
Furthermore, Republicans are supporting a man who tried to steal the 2020 election, DeMora added.
“He lied about it and still refuses to accept that he lost the election,” the Democrat said of Trump. “His whole life has been built on lies.”
Ohio Democratic Party Chairwoman Elizabeth Walters, a delegate, endorsed Harris on Monday morning, so the remaining 143 delegates are likely to follow her lead — but only because parties tend to coalesce around a single candidate, DeMora said.
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