(CTN News) – As per the Democratic National Committee’s declaration on Tuesday, Vice President Kamala Harris is the only candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination who is eligible to contest.
Just nine days after President Joe Biden withdrew from the race, leaving a vacancy at the top of the ticket, the DNC’s announcement formally cleared the way for the vice president to seek her party’s nomination unopposed, even though no other prominent Democrat had indicated any plans to challenge Harris.
The delegates to the party’s national convention will now cast their formal ratification of Harris using an online voting process that was introduced by the party only last week.
According to the press release, voting will start on Thursday and end on August 5.
All votes cast except for Harris will be counted as “present.” An Associated Press poll indicates that convention delegates overwhelmingly selected Harris to replace Biden as the party’s standard-bearer and go up against Republican former President Donald Trump in November.
A candidate may only run for the nomination if they meet the legal requirements to be president, submit a notarised declaration of candidature, and obtain the electronic signatures of at least 300 delegates, with no more than 50 signatures from any one delegation counted towards the 300 minimum required by party rules.
3,923 delegates signed a petition to nominate Harris, the DNC stated.
Delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago will still meet as scheduled in late August, notwithstanding the early vote to choose a candidate.
On the convention floor, the party will have a ceremonial roll call,, voting state by state. Following this, Harris and her soon-to-be running partner will give acceptance remarks.
According to the statement, because rank-and-file delegates overwhelmingly supported Harris, automatic delegates, sometimes referred to as superdelegates, will be permitted to cast their votes on the first ballot.
Democratic members of Congress and the party leadership are considered automatic delegates; they did not commit to backing any candidate before Biden’s withdrawal.
Following the 2016 primary, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) reduced the influence of automatic delegates, limiting their ability to cast ballots in the first round of contested primaries.
However, if a candidate “has been certified by the DNC Secretary” to have received the majority of committed delegates, automatic delegates may cast their votes in the first round.
Source: Usnews
