President Joe Biden speaks at an event celebrating the 12th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in the East Room of the White House on June 18, 2024 in Washington, DC. At left is Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images.
WASHINGTON — The Democratic National Committee has taken a major step toward formally naming Joe Biden as the party’s presidential nominee before the Democratic Convention in August — a step needed to put him on the ballot in Ohio ahead of the election of November, States Newsroom has learned.
DNC members completed their vote Thursday to move forward with a fully virtual roll call vote after 360 members voted in favor, two voted against and five abstained, a spokesperson said.
In addition, the DNC will offer an online portal where Democrats can say what they would like to see included in the national party platform as it is constructed prior to the convention.
DNC chairman Jaime Harrison wrote in a statement that during the first term of the Biden-Harris administration, “we have seen the incredible results that can come from putting democratic ideas into practice.”
“I am excited to announce that this year, through our testimonial portal, we will be able to hear from more Americans and get more input than ever before as we chart the path to the 2024 Democratic National Convention,” Harrison wrote. “We will build a platform rooted in the collective experience of Americans and mobilize people to vote for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris this November.”
Virtual roll call
To nominate Biden and Harris before Ohio’s deadline, the DNC’s Credentials Committee and Rules Committee will then have to approve their reports so that the virtual roll call, which will formally nominate Biden and Harris, can take place before the convention.
The DNC convention kicks off on August 19 in Chicago, but the state of Ohio requires presidential candidates to be formally nominated at least 90 days before Election Day.
The DNC is also moving forward with plans to hold a version of the traditional roll call during the convention, though the party wants to “build on the success” of the roll call vote held during the all-virtual 2020 presidential nominating convention, necessitated by the pandemic.
The DNC spokesperson told States Newsroom that the goal of the nomination for this year’s convention week is to attract more Americans than the delegates who are in Chicago at the United Center.
Democrats, the spokesperson said, want to revive elements of the 2020 roll call vote, which they called “Roll Call Across America.”
The all-virtual nomination at the 2020 convention saw Democratic delegates vote from historic and sometimes quirky locations.
These included the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Alabama, the Joseph R. Biden Jr. Railroad Station in Delaware, a cornfield in Iowa, an art studio and community center in Louisiana, a field of grazing cattle in Montana, Biden’s childhood home in Pennsylvania and a beach in Rhode Island where a chef held a plate of fried calamari.
Democratic platform
In addition to working on Biden and Harris’ nomination, the DNC is preparing to build the official Democratic platform in the coming weeks.
The DNC planned to open the online portal on Friday that will allow all Democrats to fill out a form indicating what they want to see in the party platform this year, the spokesperson said.
There will be both an English version and a Spanish version.
The first meeting of the Platform Committee will be on July 16, followed by the Rules Committee meeting on July 19 and the first meeting of the Credentials Committee on July 21.
Those meetings will take place the same week that Republicans gather in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to hold their convention and formally nominate Donald Trump as their presidential candidate.
All DNC committee meetings will be virtual and streamed online for all to watch. Each committee consists of approximately 200 people from the 57 states and territories.
The DNC also announced the 15 members of the platform design committee on Friday.
That list includes Speaker Louisa Terrell, former director of the White House Office of Legislative Affairs; former Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh; Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison; Ted Kaufman, who worked in Biden’s U.S. Senate office before serving as a U.S. senator from Delaware; Jeremy Bash, who previously served as chief of staff at the CIA and the US Department of Defense; Rebecca Brocato, who previously served as a special assistant to Biden and as senior director for legislative affairs at the National Security Council; Marla Blunt-Carter, who worked as a project manager and director of constituent services in Biden’s Senate office, as well as a senior advisor and political strategist for U.S. Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester; Joelle Gamble, former deputy director of the National Economic Council; Josh Hsu, former general counsel and chief legal counsel to Vice President Harris; Angela Kelley, principal advisor for policy and partnerships at the American Immigration Council and the American Immigration Lawyers Association; former South Carolina State Senator Marlon Kimpson; Rohini Kosoglu, former deputy assistant to Biden and domestic policy adviser to Harris; Lori Lodes, executive director of Climate Power, a political organization focused on tackling climate change; Jeff Peck, who worked for Biden on the Senate Judiciary Committee as general counsel and staff director in the late 1980s and early 1990s; Bharat Ramamurti, former deputy director of the National Economic Council; and Hilda Solis, Secretary of Labor during the Obama administration.
The first meeting of the editorial committee will take place on July 11. It will take place virtually and be available for anyone to watch on the DNC’s YouTube page.
Minyon Moore, chairman of the Democratic National Convention Committee, wrote in a statement that as we make the “final sprint to the 2024 Democratic National Convention, we look forward to tapping into the rich diversity of our party and listening to Americans from all walks of life.” population as we chart a course for the next four years under the leadership of President Biden and Vice President Harris.”
“The strength of the Democratic Party is our diversity and together we will build a platform that reaffirms who we are as Democrats and puts us on a path to victory again this November.”
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