


Looks like self-help guru Marianne Williamson and Minnesota Representative Dean Phillips have got you covered! The Hill’s Filip Timotija reports that both long-shot Democratic presidential candidates will square off onstage in Manchester, New Hampshire on January 8 “at an event that won’t feature their main competitor, President Biden.”
By debating in New Hampshire this close to the state’s rogue January 23 primary, Williamson and Phillips are clearly trying to remind Granite State voters that Biden will not appear on their 2024 primary ballot. (Recall that the Democratic National Committee elevated South Carolina — the state that helped Biden win the 2020 nomination — over New Hampshire in this cycle’s Democratic presidential nominating calendar.)
Phillips in particular has been ratcheting up his attacks on Biden in recent weeks, calling the president a threat to democracy and dinging him for not being able to maintain a robust campaign schedule because of his advanced age. But even his House Democratic colleagues are quick to point out that Phillips is still polling far behind the president even in New Hampshire, where the congressman is focusing his campaign. As I recently reported in National Review:
Any mention of Phillips sends Democratic lawmakers into a tailspin. “If you’re a Democrat, you respect the process. He’s not respecting the process,” [former House Democratic whip Jim] Clyburn told National Review in a brief interview last month.
Biden allies insist they aren’t concerned that Phillips can win New Hampshire. But they do worry privately that a strong or even closer-than-expected showing from Phillips in the Granite State’s January primary — where Biden will not appear on the ballot — could embarrass the president with negative media coverage ahead of the general election.
In the lead-up to that primary, Democrats are counting their lucky stars that the president’s name is easy to spell as a write-in option.