Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) said on Sunday that he’s “well positioned” to become president but hasn’t decided whether he will challenge President Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination, calling on other party members to join the race.
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“I think I’m well positioned to be president [of] the United States. … I do not believe I’m well positioned to run for it right now,” the centrist Democrat said on CBS’s Face the Nation in response to polls showing most in his party prefer a different candidate, other than Biden, for the 2024 presidential race.
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Phillips said “people who are” in a better position now to run against the incumbent should do so because “that is what the country is asking.”
“If we don’t heed that call, shame on us. And the consequences, I believe, are going to be disastrous,” Phillips said. “So my call is to those who are well positioned, well prepared, a good character and competency — they know who they are — to jump in because Democrats and the country need competition. It makes everything better.”
Biden is up against challenges from various candidates, including author Marianne Williamson and lawyer and medical activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
As some polls indicate that nearly half of the nation is split between Biden or former President Donald Trump, 64% of Democratic voters said they would prefer someone other than the incumbent, according to a recent New York Times/Siena College poll.
Phillips, 54, said, “I don’t believe [Kennedy] to be a Democrat,” and suggested he was skeptical about a third-party ticket from other notable names, such as Cornel West.
Discussion about Phillips’s prospects of a 2024 White House bid came as he met with donors last week in New York about a possible primary matchup against Biden.
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Phillips, a business-friendly centrist and member of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, said he’s afraid of a “tone-deaf” bubble in Washington and that the overwhelming number of Democrats seeking alternative candidates inspired his “call to action.”
“The moment is now. That is what the country is asking,” Phillips said.
