Writer Garrett Graff points, out that “a record-breaking 11,000 baby boomers are turning 65 every day in 2024, which means all kinds of Americans are thinking about stepping back.” (Washington Post Aug. 5, 2024). If you watched the Democratic convention in Chicago, the dominant cry coming out of the United Center was “We’re not going back.” They were talking about not going back to Trump and what his administration offered between January 2017 and January 2021. And to take this a step further, to what Trump and his MAGA crowd is offering again in the form of Project 2025.

There is a difference between stepping back and stepping aside. Stepping aside is not what Ruth Bader Ginsburg did. It is what Joe Biden did. But only after initially fighting to stay. Democratic leaders then mounted a concerted effort to convince him that it was time. If he stayed, he risked paving the way for the defeat of many Democrats. Unlike Ginsburg he did not gamble on what was looking like a bad bet.

For the past year it was quite clear the electorate wanted someone different from “two old men.” Biden’s approval rating for the 13th quarter of his presidency was an abysmal 38 percent, the lowest in modern presidential polling going all the way back to Eisenhower. After Biden’s disastrous debate with Trump in June 2024, CBS/You Gov Poll asked this question, “Does Biden have the mental and cognitive health to serve as President?” 27 percent said he does and 72 percent said he does not. Hello out there. Is anyone paying attention?

July 2024 seemed ridiculously late for the Democratic Party to change horses. Biden had wrapped up delegates for the nomination. Many Democrats seemed certain that Biden’s historic record of accomplishments would help carry the day for their now elderly and frail looking president. But polling from a broad array of respected firms made it clear the president had serious problems with the base of Democratic voters.

Six months earlier, in February 2024 in an open “Dear Mr. President” letter that ran in The Macomb Daily, I painted the picture for the president and his staff. The bleeding in the Democratic base was from young voters, black voters, brown voters, and progressives. I wrote, “In 2020 you beat Trump among 18-24-year-olds by 24 points! Today your race with Trump shows it to be even among young voters. A recent poll showed you only running even with the Hispanic community after winning their vote by 2-1 in 2020. In another poll your support from the African American community declined from 90% in 2020 to 71% today. My Arab American friends and their leaders tell me that you are in deep trouble in their communities after winning them in 2020.”

These alarm bells should have created an immediate concern for change at the top of the ticket. But at age 81, Biden still refused to face the reality that Ginsburg had also rejected. It was time to go. It was only after his disastrous debate that it became crystal clear the party needed to change the ticket at the very top. A failure to recognize and act upon this historic crisis might lead to a Trump victory at age 78 and the dire consequences that would follow for our families, our country, our democracy, and world order. Our country had just experienced this very crisis at the U.S. Supreme Court.

Ginsburg

The failure of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to heed calls for her retirement, ended up tarnishing her otherwise stellar record for equality. In 2012 Ginsburg had already gone through battles with colon and pancreatic cancers. She was obstinate in ignoring calls for her to step aside and gambled that Obama would win re-election. He did. But Ginsburg’s serious health issues continued to plague her. She rolled the dice again refusing to step aside and this time she came up snake eyes. Trump defeated Hillary Clinton. Pancreatic cancer took the justice’s life at the age 87 in September 2020. Her dying wish to not have Donald Trump choose her replacement was of course ignored. Amy Coney Barrett succeeded Ginsburg on the highest court of the land ensuring a conservative Supreme Court for the foreseeable future.

In Politico Magazine in June of 2022 author Michael Schaffer wrote, “With the Supreme Court poised to reverse Roe v. Wade, Ginsburg’s decision not to step down during the Obama administration looms large in the estimation of some of her admirers, who see it as enabling the destruction of a large part of Ginsburg’s legacy.”

Dorothy Samuels, author of many New York Times legal editorials wrote, “…what she helped to give us is a court that for a long, long time is going to be undoing the equality rulings that she was part of. It was an extraordinarily self-centered thing to do.”

Stanford Law Professor Michele Dauber said, “She just didn’t gamble with herself, she gambled with the rights of my daughter, and granddaughter. And unfortunately, that’s her legacy. I think it’s tragic.” (Shaffer in Politico). Linda Hirshman, a lawyer and author of a dual biography of Ginsburg and Sandra Day O’Conner, echoed similar concerns. “Taking a gamble against actuarial odds will lead to much of the undoing of Ginsburg’s work. Retiring might have made her more important than every decision she wrote on the Supreme Court.”

Looming over the Democratic Party heads in the summer of 2024 was the sword of Damocles. Those heads were only saved at the eleventh hour when at the behest of top party leaders and the petitions of many former members of Congress, and some clear headed and courageous sitting congresspersons, Biden was persuaded to step aside. The only logical choice at this late hour was his Vice President, Kamala Harris.

Prior and during Biden’s struggle to decide to stay or leave, I was in regular contact with many former members of Congress, most of whom are in their 70s and 80s. While some thought he should “stick it out” the overwhelming number thought he should step aside. In a reunion call with about ten members three days after the Trump/Biden debate I argued that the president should step aside for his vice president. Tom Allen, a thoughtful former member from Maine, also made a strong case for Kamala Harris noting her abilities to rally Democrats who were hungry for an alternative. He said, “Kamala Harris’s candidacy puts a full stop to the national angst about two old men.” Then Tom said something I will always remember, “smooth transitions are what vice presidents are for.”

However, it seemed that many on the call did not have a clear vision of Kamala Harris’s abilities to arouse passion and, as it turns out joy.

Also participating in the zoom call was Kathy Gille who ran my Whip operations and worked with me in Congress for 22 years. She suggested to our assembled group that we watch on YouTube a powerful speech that V.P. Harris gave at Fiske University in Nashville honoring the Tennessee Three. I was stunned by the power of the speech, and I began sending it out to as many people as I could. It was passionate, touching, and logically connected to the issues of democracy, fairness, transparency, and racial justice. I sent it to people I thought needed to give Kamala Harris another look. I put myself in that category.

It has now been almost two months since Biden announced his withdrawal and his choice of Harris as the Democratic nominee. She has acquitted herself well in her public appearances especially in her speech to an aroused convention. She has chosen wisely by picking Coach Walz as her Vice President. Harris has generated a huge amount of enthusiasm in the Democratic Party just as Tom Allen and Kathy Gille predicted. In polling she has brought back the Democratic base. So far so good, but as Kamala Harris says, “We have a race to win.” These next two months will be a battle.

It is important to remember that with all the positive things accomplished by Biden, the thing that he may be remembered most for is his critical decision to step aside.

David Bonior is a former Congressman representing Macomb County, serving from 1977 until his retirement in 2003, and the author of six books.