WASHINGTON — Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) has a presidential tour bus and a welcoming slogan — “Everyone’s Invited!” — but no one in Washington seems to even care about his longshot primary challenge to President Joe Biden.
Asking Democrats about Phillips’ run gets awkward real quick. When Raw Story asked Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) about the congressman with whom she sat through freshman orientation in 2019, the congresswoman fell silent for a full 30 seconds, first in the hall and then in an elevator.
“Excuse us,” her legislative director said. “Let me make sure our comms director just gets back to you. Do you have our comm’s director’s info? Let me just give you my card if that’s easier.”
On the elevator ride up to the House floor, as her aide fumbled and blocked, Raw Story kept looking at Pressley who wanted to answer but struggled to find the right — delicate yet depressingly honest — words.
“Dean’s a classmate — we came in together,” Pressley finally told Raw Story. “You know, I will not be supporting his presidential campaign.”
While Phillips is on Pressley’s radar, he’s yet to show up on Rep. Pat Ryan’s (D-NY).
“I honestly haven’t even paid attention to that. Like, truly,” Ryan told Raw Story. “I'm all in for President Biden. He's kicked ass. He's led the party. He’s led the country.”
Phillips has some company, if it’s depressing companionship.
“I like Dean,” Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) told Raw Story. “I’m supporting Biden though.”
Swalwell can appreciate Phillips’ situation: he had his own cringe-inducing presidential primary bid in 2020.
“I can't really talk. I had my own longshot bid for president that didn’t go very far,” Swalwell told Raw Story.
Swalwell dropped out after his poll number hovered around 1 percent.
At 4 percent nationally, Phillips is blowing him out of the proverbial water, although Biden continues to obliterate Phillips and fellow Democratic presidential candidate Marianne Williamson by massive margins.
Phillips, a three-term congressman, says he’s not running to oppose Biden’s record, and by extension, the record of the Democratic Party.
Rather, during his kick-off event in New Hampshire last month, Phillips told the small crowd he was launching his bid because it’s “time for the torch to be passed to a new generation of American leaders.”
Don’t tell that to the multimillionaire's colleagues in Washington. Swalwell says this November's election returns — where Democrats won a clutch abortion battle in Ohio, while also maintaining the governor’s mansion in Kentucky and recapturing control of the entire legislative branch in Virginia — bode well for Biden in 2024.
“It shows that the playbook is working. We don’t need to reinvent the playbook,” Swalwell said.
Before coming to Congress, Phillips was a coffee shop owner, president of a liquor company, chairman of a gelato company.
His history of running things isn’t helping with his presidential bid, at least at the Capitol where he’s barely even the butt of jokes.
“I have given it less than 10 seconds of thought,” Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) told Raw Story. “I've had other previous colleagues run for president, I just haven't thought about it this time, because I just don't see a serious challenge to an incumbent president that's done as much as President Biden’s done in the last two years.”
If a progressive such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) was running to the left of Biden, then that would make more sense to Pocan, who’s a Congressional Progressive Caucus chair emeritus.
“There’d be a case more than, ‘He’s too old,’” Pocan said, summing up Phillips’ campaign slogan — at least the slogan congressional Democrats have slapped on his longshot bid.
For congressional Democrats, it’s personal, because ripping on Biden’s record is ripping on their own legislative record.
“Everything that we're running on is House Democrats. Just things we got done with the president, which is more than I got done in my entire career in Congress in one session,” Pocan said. “So I wouldn't want to be the person crafting talking points for Dean Phillips. I haven't really thought about it.”
Many Democratic lawmakers are wondering why Phillips is running at all.
“I’m not sure where it goes, and I think we lose a pretty thoughtful member of Congress as a result,” Rep. Dan Kildee (D-MI) told Raw Story.
Kildee doubts Phillips’ campaign will go anywhere.
“I think ultimately, because at the end of it all, we're talking about Joe Biden, his personality, his presence and his record, versus Donald Trump, his personality presence and record — in his case, it might be an actual record,” Kildee said.
Recent polls have been bad for Biden, who turned 81 years old this week. But Kildee isn’t worried. He says it’s early.
“I'm anxious about every election when it comes up, and there are always these sorts of variables that work against this,” Kildee said. “I look at the success — not just in the four years that he will be defending — but in the first few years of his presidency. It's a record that a president for eight years would be proud to run on.”
Sympathy is not support, but it seems to be the only love Phillips is getting on Capitol Hill these days.
“I know that he's sincere, and that he has absolutely no chance,” Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) told Raw Story. “I fear for him that he’s being ridiculed by many, which isn’t fun for anybody.”
Phillips may only be registering as a blip in the polls, but Democrats are waiting and watching to see if a true third-party effort emerges in 2024, especially if retiring Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) or former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R-MD) declare presidential campaigns as independents.
“I do think that the greater threats to a Biden reelection are [independent presidential candidate] Robert Kennedy, No Labels — a much greater threat,” Beyer said. “If you get a Gov. Hogan in or a Manchin in, then that's an existential threat.”
