CNN anchor Brianna Keilar asked Democratic South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn Wednesday whether his party’s failure to hold an open primary in 2024 contributed to its current lack of strong leadership.
Democrats are facing record-low favorability as top lawmakers — such as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries — garnered criticism for not effectively leading their party. Keilar, on “CNN News Central,” asked Clyburn if the lack of a primary in 2024 complicated Democratic efforts to compete.
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“I do want to ask you — because of this discord in the party — in 2024, there was no open Democratic primary. We didn’t really get to see a bench of Democratic voices. We could have seen that if Joe Biden had stepped down sooner,” Keilar said. “But I wonder if not being able to see that and have that sort of national stage for those folks, if you can draw a line from that to a lack of more practiced leadership in the Democratic Party, as we’re seeing right now?”
Clyburn responded that he was not sure and declined to elaborate further.
“Well, I don‘t know if you can draw a line or not, but I know I don’t waste any time drawing lines. I learned very early not to spend a whole lot of time crying over spilled milk,” Clyburn said. “The campaign is over. We’ve lost the election. What we’ve got to do now is develop a response to the American people on what we as Democrats are going to do going forward.
“And so whether or not Joe Biden should have dropped out earlier, whether or not we should have had a primary, that is of no consequence at this particular juncture in our lives,” he continued. “We have got to figure out how to best approach governance in such a way that everybody will feel a part of this process, showing that we are protecting people’s dreams and aspirations, not allowing this administration to continue to throw up these shiny objects while they implement what I call Jim Crow 2.0.”
Former Vice President Kamala Harris resoundingly lost to President Donald Trump in November following the party replacing Biden with her despite her lack of primary voter approval. Just days before Biden dropped out, Clyburn had insisted that Biden possessed “one of the best minds” he had ever witnessed.
Schumer said on Wednesday that Democrats’ current mission is to hurt Trump’s popularity.
“We are fighting on all of the fronts to go after Trump, not have a circular firing squad, which Democrats tend to do, particularly when there’s such an enemy as Trump … And we have so many different areas to go after him on,” Schumer said. “And we’re already bringing his numbers down. We’ll keep bringing them down more and more and more. If, you know, six months from now, his numbers are really low, he’ll have not only less popularity, he’ll have less authority. That’s our job and we’re doing it.”
Meanwhile, Trump’s approval rating is tied with its highest point across both of his terms at 47%, according to an NBC News poll published on Sunday.
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