With the 2024 presidential election approaching fast the presidential campaign trail is beginning to heat up, but one thing is still missing: a traditional presidential campaign.
I have noticed a decline in campaign materials from the two leading candidates, republican Donald Trump and democrat Joe Biden in comparison to other years. In an unscientific survey conducted by The Oracle of 315 students, over half of South students said that they have not seen campaign materials from the Biden campaign regarding the upcoming election. This problem is not due to laziness or lack of funding, but because of a much larger political phenomenon: no choice politics.
No choice politics refers to a political situation or system in which voters are given two options, one slightly more appealing option, and one option that is considered unfavorable, this causes government officials and political candidates to simply assume they will get the vote, Josh Barro at Business Insider said.
The way I see it, the Biden campaign is using this exact strategy. They believe that by calling out president Donald Trump as an accused sexual predator and fraudulent businessman and comparing him to Joe Biden, the majority of the American people will pick Biden because they may view him as the morally better candidate.
What is so funny about this campaign strategy and no choice politics in general is its history of failure. For example, Britian’s exit from the European Union (Brexit), where in 2013, former British Prime Minister David Cameron proposed the idea of leaving the European Union (EU) to the British people, assuming that the EU offers enough economic and social benefits for the citizens of Britain, Former Prime Minister Cameron did almost nothing to encourage citizens to vote against Brexit, simply assuming that leaving the EU was so unfathomable, that no one would vote for it, and yet 52 percent of voters supported leaving the EU.
I strongly believe that the Biden campaign is ignorant for thinking that the American people will choose him over Trump simply because they have made Trump seem like a bad person.
However, the American people do not view Biden as a good candidate either- and only 33 percent of Americans believe that Biden is doing a good job as president, according to Pew Research Center. When asked who students would vote for if they were old enough to vote, only 33 percent of students said they would vote to re-elect Biden.
This campaign strategy of ignorance and assumption from the Biden campaign will ultimately prove unsuccessful and leave adverse effects for American citizens and global peace, or whatever is left of it.
The Biden campaign needs to move away from no choice politics, and start to actually run a presidential campaign.
