OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Former First Lady Michelle Obama led political analysts to predict, once again, that she will become the Democratic Party’s 2024 presidential nominee with remarks she made during a podcast this week.
Appearing on Jay Shetty’s “On Purpose” podcast, the host asked her what keeps her up at night.
“What keeps me up are the things that I know: the war in the region, in too many regions. What is AI going to do for us? The environment, you know, are we moving at all fast enough?” she began.
“What are we doing about education? Are people going to vote? And why aren’t people voting? Are we too stuck to our phones? I mean, these are the things that keep me up because you don’t have control over them, and you wonder, where are people, where are we in this, where are our hearts? What’s going to happen in this next election?” she continued.
“I am terrified about what could possibly happen. Because our leaders matter. Who we select, who speaks for us, who holds that bully pulpit. It affects us in ways that, sometimes, I think people take it for granted,” she added. “You know, the fact that people think that government — ‘eh, does it really even do anything?’ — And I’m like, oh my God, does government do everything for us, and we cannot take this democracy for granted. And sometimes, I worry that we do. Those are the things that keep me up.”
Her comments led longtime Republican operative Roger Stone, a vehement ally of former President Donald Trump, to predict anew that she was “positioning” herself to be the nominee.
I continue to predict – as I have for well over two years – that Michelle Obama will be the Democrat Party Nominee for President in 2024.
🚨WATCH as she further positions herself: pic.twitter.com/45qvIAvkIh
— Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) January 8, 2024
The exchange with Shetty, a British-Indian author and co-founder of Same Tea, came as a top financial analyst predicted in a note to clients this week that President Joe Biden will drop out of the race sometime this year.
Michael Cembalest, who leads JPMorgan Chase’s market and investment strategy unit in the financial giant’s asset management division, wrote that Biden, 81, will leave the race “sometime between Super Tuesday and the November election, citing health concerns.”
Super Tuesday, which is scheduled for March 5, involves primaries in more than a dozen states, including California, Texas, Massachusetts, Vermont and North Carolina. In the modern era, whoever wins the bulk of Super Tuesday primaries is considered the frontrunner and eventual party nominee.
Cembalest justified his prediction by citing Biden’s taking approval rating, especially for a president who can claim “around 10% job creation since his inauguration,” though much if not most of that was caused by Americans returning to the workforce after lengthy COVID shutdowns, which Cembalest noted in a forecast letter to investors and clients.
He didn’t predict who would take Biden’s spot but predicted it would be “a replacement candidate named by the Democratic National Committee.”
Conventional wisdom suggests that Vice President Kamala Harris would be the logical replacement, but she is extremely unpopular — more so than Biden — with a 55-percent disapproval rating according to political analysis site FiveThirtyEight.
That said, “Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) and self-help author Marianne Williamson are the only other Democrats who have declared their candidacies,” the New York Post noted.
Cembalest is not the only one who has predicted Biden will leave the race — or should leave it.
In November, longtime longtime Democratic strategist and operative who helped Barack Obama win two terms is all but begging President Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 race.
David Axelrod made his plea following the release of a New York Times/Siena College poll of registered voters that spelled excessively bad news for Biden. The poll found Biden trailing former President Donald Trump in five of six critical swing states a year out from the election and having only a 2-point lead over Trump in a sixth battleground state.
“Only Joe Biden can make this decision. If he continues to run, he will be the nominee of the Democratic Party,” Axelrod noted on the X platform. “What he needs to decide is whether that is wise; whether it’s in HIS best interest or the country’s?”
