Democrats sell themselves as the ones who are pro-democracy and ready to allow everyone to vote, including minor children and illegal immigrants.
Yet Democratic Party leaders in Florida apparently seek to shield low-polling President Joe Biden from internal competition, and thus will give their voters only one choice in next year’s presidential primary.
Newsweek reported Friday that the Florida Democratic Party agreed to exclude Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips and two other longshot candidates from the ballot.
Read: Florida Gov. DeSantis Calls Biden Impeachment Probe “Justifiable”
“Americans would expect the absence of democracy in Tehran, not Tallahassee,” Phillips said in a statement. “The intentional disenfranchisement of voters runs counter to everything for which our Democratic Party and country stand. Our mission as Democrats is to defeat authoritarians, not become them.”
According to Newsweek, Florida law gave both Republicans and Democrats until last Thursday to submit to the state the names of candidates on their respective primary ballots.
Yet Florida Democratic leaders gave the state Biden’s name on Nov. 1 and declared he would be the only one.
Phillips entered the race about a week before that.
But the party’s decision to protect Biden also left out author Marianne Williamson, who ran in 2020, and left-wing analysts Cenk Uygur, host of “The Young Turks” political show.
According to Newsweek, Uygur is ineligible to become president because he is a naturalized citizen. He came to America from Turkey in 1978.
Williamson’s campaign, which has been active since February, asserted the party’s action broke the rules of the Democratic National Committee. She pledged to “seek every legal recourse to oppose this undemocratic manipulation.”
Read: Oregon Decriminalized Drugs But Now Having Second Thoughts
In a statement to Newsweek on Saturday, Williamson complained, “What they are trying to do is essentially authoritarian in nature. A political party’s role should be to facilitate democracy, not thwart it. This action is terrible for the party and terrible for our democracy.”
“When I was a child, we were told that in the Soviet Union people could vote, but then were told who their options were. And that’s exactly what’s happening here,” Williamson said.
Also, on Saturday, the party denied any wrongdoing in denying the three candidates a slot on the ballot.
“The Florida Democratic Party followed its process, and the State Executive Committee voted unanimously to send one name, Joe Biden, to the Secretary of State as a candidate for the party’s nomination for president,” an unnamed party spokesperson told Newsweek.
“It is not uncommon for an incumbent President to be declared the automatic winner of a presidential primary,” the spokesperson added, pointing out that the party did likewise when former President Barack Obama sought re-election in 2012.
The difference now, however, is that Obama was far more popular at the time than Biden is now.
FiveThirtyEight.com notes that at this point in their respective presidencies, about 1,050 days in, Obama was polling an approval rating of 45%. Biden right now is at 37.6%.
Android Users, Click To Download The Free Press App And Never Miss A Story. Follow Us On Facebook and Twitter. Sign up for our free newsletter.
We can’t do this without your help; visit our GiveSendGo page and donate any dollar amount; every penny helps