Is Biden v. Trump inevitable? Not if the parties let the voters decide

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) last week called for lower-polling Republican presidential candidates to drop out of the race no later than Feb. 26 to set up “a two-person race before Mr. Trump has the nomination sewn up.”

The 2012 Republican presidential nominee wants GOP “megadonors and influencers —large and small … to do something they didn’t do in 2016” — pressure their preferred candidates to withdraw before it’s too late and a zealous minority dominates the splintered majority.  

But, before Oct. 1, when the situation becomes in extremis, Romney should urge influential people in the GOP establishment – starting with his niece Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel – to reform the party nominating process and let the voters weed out non-viable candidates.

Rather than arm-twisting, cabals and threats of recrimination in closed-door meetings against “no-hope candidates,” voters should be allowed to decide in a democratic and transparent manner which aspirants should move forward or step aside. To achieve that salutary outcome, GOP state party committees should upgrade their rules before Oct. 1 in either of two ways.

Republicans could award delegates as the Democrats do, allocating them proportionally to their respective shares of the popular vote won in a state’s primary. If, after the primaries, no candidate has garnered enough delegates to win the nomination outright, then the old-fashioned method of bargaining and horse-trading at the national convention would produce a nominee as it has done for almost two centuries.  

Those methods produced many nominees of the stature Romney urges, “with character, driven by something greater than revenge and ego, preferably from the next generation.” The earlier national conventions, aside from being exciting displays of democracy in action, resulted in the election of many decent American presidents and some really great ones — neither of which will happen in 2024 if the current stunted political course is not changed.

If Republican officials at the state and national levels are averse to emulating the proportional representation model Democrats use for choosing their party nominees, they could devise their own approach. They could follow what so many cities and states do in filling their executive offices involving multiple candidates, and what Georgia and nine other states do in choosing their U.S. senators — hold run-off elections.

States could require that winner-take-all delegates are awarded only to the candidate with the majority, not a mere plurality, of the votes cast in the primary. If no one reaches 50 percent plus one, a runoff of the top two vote-winners would be held within 30 days.

Practiced over many, if not all, states, it would ensure that the probable nominee reflects the choice of the party’s majority and is more likely to unify the party going into the November election.

For a long time, America’s voting system was the envy of most of the world, producing serious and energetic, if protracted, contests that resulted in the emergence of a president who could earn the respect of people in other countries. That has not been the case in the last few elections, seen by most voters as a choice between the lesser of two evils. The quality of the two major party candidates, and their power to lead and inspire, has steadily declined just as the increasingly dangerous international situation has required strong, capable, respected American leadership.  

The 2024 election threatens to shame America’s democracy in the eyes of the world and cheer authoritarians everywhere if it offers another Biden-Trump contest. Not only will the campaign itself be a degrading and dispiriting experience for the country, as each will hurl insults and slurs at the other (and both will be mostly right). But then there will be the reality of an eventual winner and the nation will be consigned to suffer under another four years of either of them — while the loser’s party will devote itself to bitterly undermining the authority of the unfit victor.  

America’s enemies can only be salivating at the almost unlimited opportunities that will be presented to poison further the nation’s mood and paralyze the U.S. capacity for effective governance and serious response to the world’s challenges. 

Democrats have a simpler, but more difficult, solution — conduct at least two debates and allow other prospective candidates to take the stage with the president. But it would mean admitting deep public unhappiness with President Biden’s decision not to step aside graciously. Stubborn pride, Biden’s and the party’s, probably precludes that enlightened course of action.

So, the two parties hurtle, as in a Greek myth, toward a fateful confrontation that will seriously damage our politics, and out country.

I registered as a Republican for the first time in 2008 because of my deep admiration for Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). As an independent until then, I had voted for Democrats, Republicans and third-party candidates, and I had served with pride in both Republican and Democratic administrations in Massachusetts and Washington.

This time, unless something significantly changes in the nominating processes of one or both major parties to alter the course toward a Biden-Trump rematch, I plan to vote for neither. Instead, I look forward, with desperate hope, to a respectable alternative from the No Labels organization.

In addition, if the GOP ends up nominating Trump, which looks increasingly likely, I will change my party registration back to independent, where it was for decades and where it will probably remain. 

By virtue of character and personal qualities alone, the two parties are offering the most depressing and divisive choices since the last two elections. Now, with the sordid and alarming things we have learned about each of them since the 2020 election, both deserve to be judged as fundamentally unfit to serve as leader of the free world in these perilous times.  

Whichever party changes its nominee will almost certainly win the election. If both do, the country will win with a decent, healthy contest between two ethically, intellectually and physically fit candidates. If neither changes, a third candidate may either win or throw the election to the House of Representatives.

Joseph Bosco served as China country director for the secretary of Defense from 2005 to 2006 and as Asia-Pacific director of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief from 2009 to 2010. He served in the Pentagon when Vladimir Putin invaded Georgia and was involved in Department of Defense discussions about the U.S. response. Follow him on Twitter @BoscoJosephA.