Everyone is different. While the Republican primaries were being crushed by Donald Trump, the Democrats were gearing up for a false start for their nominations race in New Hampshire. Held on the same day as the Republican primary, Tuesday, January 23, the Democratic primary featured a curiosity: Joe Biden is not on the ballot. No delegates are at stake in the run-up to the August convention in Chicago, which would invest the party's candidate. The Democratic National Committee (DNC) does not recognize this ballot and, as a result, sanctions New Hampshire, which has refused to accept its relegation in the protocol order of states, which would have required the revision of a 1975 local law.
Biden and the DNC decided that the more diverse South Carolina would open their candidacy race. South Carolina is also the state where the president had triumphed in his party's primary at the end of February 2020 and relaunched his campaign. The president was not on the list of candidates for January 23. But his allies and supporters, sensing the trap, had embarked on a vast operation in the autumn to get Democrats out to the polls and write in the name "Joe Biden" by hand, which the law allows. "This is a grassroots initiative, started by conversations between friends and neighbors," explained Angela Brennan, a Democrat elected to the New Hampshire House of Representatives. "Nearly 250 volunteers will be in front of polling stations on Tuesday to inform and guide voters. We're feeling the enthusiasm and building on it."
This was an unofficial, informal campaign, which the Biden-Harris team did not claim to be running. It aimed to avoid any risk of humiliation should the president's score prove disappointing against the other, albeit second-tier, contenders. These main contenders are Dean Phillips, 55, a centrist member of the Minnesota House of Representatives, and author and activist Marianne Williamson, 71, who presents herself as a progressive spiritual leader. Since announcing his candidacy at the end of October 2023, Phillips has complained a great deal about the lack of consideration he has received from the mainstream American media, particularly television. Politically, nothing distinguishes him from the Democratic president, as evidenced by his consistently loyal votes in Congress.
Phillips' main argument can be summed up in one line: Biden is no longer in a position to campaign, to endure the solicitations and demands. In a video intended to mock the president's absence from New Hampshire, his rival compared him to the elusive Bigfoot, a hairy biped, half-monkey, half-man, a figure of American folklore. "The reason I did this is because Joe Biden cannot win this next election," said Phillips justifying his candidacy in an interview with NBC on January 19. "He was the only one that could have won in 2020. He's probably the only one that can lose this in 2024."
The president had finished only fifth in the New Hampshire primary in early 2020. The few polls taken in recent weeks gave him a strong advantage over his rivals, but the bizarre and illegible nature of this poll presents a potential risk for Biden. The New Hampshire Secretary of State anticipates a turnout of just 88,000. This vote will be the first electoral test of his name, even if it is handwritten. Yet the president is currently doubly vulnerable as a result of low support for his actions in the polls and his perceived physical frailty, due to his age, 81. His main expected advantage is the determination to block Trump and the resulting incentive this generates among Democratic, progressive and centrist voters.
On Monday, the eve of the election, a strange controversy was added to this bizarre context. NBC, followed by the other major US media, detailed the existence of an automated phone-call campaign designed to demotivate Democrats and drive down turnout. Through digital manipulation or recourse to artificial intelligence, a bogus recording of Biden called on activists to "save (their) vote for the November election." According to the message, "Voting this Tuesday only enables the Republicans in their quest to elect Donald Trump again. Your vote makes a difference in November, not this Tuesday." It is not known how many people were the recipients of this automated call, nor who was the perpetrator of this "illegal attempt to disrupt and suppress voting," according to the New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella. An investigation has been opened. This is the first identified use of artificial intelligence to interfere in the 2024 election.
Translation of an original article published in French on lemonde.fr; the publisher may only be liable for the French version.