Marianne Williamson Is Making A Play For Joe Biden’s DNC Delegates

Marianne Williamson wants to step into the void. With the future of President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign in doubt, Williamson’s emissaries have been reaching out to Democratic National Convention delegates to convince them to pull support from Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. 

“They called me yesterday morning to see if I would send a notarized letter rescinding my support of Biden-Harris,” New York State Assembly Member Robert Carroll told TPM in a phone conversation on Friday. 

“Utter lunacy … on their part,” he added. “I mean, I just think it’s insane.”

A second Democratic National Convention delegate, who requested anonymity to discuss the nomination process, told TPM they knew of another delegate who received outreach from Williamson’s campaign in addition to Carroll. According to Carroll, the person from Williamson’s team framed the delegate play as an effort to nominate a new Democratic candidate in response to the concerns that have erupted inside the party following Biden’s lackluster performance in his June debate against former President Trump. 

Carroll, who first revealed the calls from Williamson’s team on Twitter, noted he is a pledged delegate. There are over 3,900 pledged DNC delegates from around the country, and the rules specify that they should “in all good conscience reflect the sentiments of those who elected them” and back the winners of the Democratic primary in the area they represent. Because of his victories in the primary, which was largely uncontested, the vast majority of these delegates are pledged to Biden. 

For his part, Carroll said he is going to nominate Biden at the convention both due to his obligation as a pledged delegate and because he thinks the president is still the best choice to defeat Trump, despite the concerns reportedly raised by party leaders about his candidacy. 

“I’m an elected member of the Democratic Party. I represent about 145,000 people. I’m an elected delegate. I take that all very, very seriously,” Carroll said, adding, “I think it’s a team effort … and I think we need to stop having a … circular firing squad. 

“Though I will agree that the debate performance was poor,” he added, “the hysteria of the last three weeks is significantly worse.” 

Williamson is a “spiritually progressive” author and self-help guru who has stopped and started a presidential bid multiple times during this election cycle. She initially dropped out of the race on Feb. 7 after receiving roughly four percent of the vote in the New Hampshire Democratic primary and about two percent in South Carolina’s Democratic primary. Williamson, who also mounted an unsuccessful presidential bid in 2020, announced the unsuspension of her campaign three weeks later before ending it again last month. After her halting primary bid, Williamson has resurfaced in the midst of the Democratic Party’s post-debate drama. 

Biden’s performance in that debate, which included multiple moments where he seemed to lose his train of thought and have difficulty expressing himself, have led to widespread concerns about his age, health and whether he can lead the party to victory in November. In recent weeks, numerous Democrats have called for him to abandon his re-election bid, citing their fears he cannot defeat Trump. Despite reports Friday that Biden’s family has considered a potential exit plan, his campaign team has insisted he “is more committed than ever to beat Donald Trump.” On July 3, Williamson announced that she was re-re-entering the race and said the debate made “very clear that the Democrats need a new nominee on the ballot.” Since then, she has launched the operation focused on the DNC delegates.

The delegates are set to nominate the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate in a virtual roll call ahead of the convention, which will take place in Chicago starting Aug. 19. In addition to the pledged delegates, there are 739 automatic delegates, who are often called superdelegates. The automatic delegates can vote to nominate any candidate of their choosing, but, as a result of reforms put in place in the wake of the contested 2016 Democratic primary, they cannot vote on the first ballot. A candidate can secure the nomination by winning a majority in that initial vote. If Biden does indeed step aside, his pledged delegates would be released. However, the concerns about his candidacy have caused some delegates and others to wonder if the “good conscience” clause in the party’s rules might allow them to break away even without Biden deciding to end his run. 

Williamson’s delegate play is centered on this idea. Earlier this week, she released a video outlining her message to delegates and suggesting they can “open up this convention” by sending letters to the DNC. Williamson stressed that these letters would need to be “notarized” and submitted before Friday. 

“The only chance now to stop this is for you who are delegates to use your power and to step in,” Williamson said in the clip, adding, “You do that by sending a communication … saying that you as a delegate to this convention no longer automatically pledge your vote to Joe Biden, that, according to the dictates of your conscience and your firm belief that we’re in trouble regarding the election in November, you want to hear from any other candidates, you want to open up this convention.” 

In her video, Williamson stressed that she was not calling for delegates to pledge to support her. 

“What I’m asking you to do is to just pledge to opening up the convention,” Williamson said. 

In a note on her site that accompanied the video, Williamson suggested the show of opposition to Biden was focused on convincing the DNC to eliminate a planned, early virtual roll call ahead of the in-person convention. Amid the questions surrounding Biden, others in the party have also raised concerns about the early roll call, which has not been scheduled. In a letter to committee members on Wednesday, the co-chairs of the DNC rules committee indicated the roll call would not occur before Aug. 1 and said it needed to take place prior to the convention due to concerns about ballot access.

Carroll, the New York delegate who received the call from Williamson’s team, said they offered to send him text for a potential letter opposing Biden’s nomination.

“I told them that I was uninterested and that I wasn’t going to humor them,” he said.  

Williamson’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment asking how many delegates they believe signed the letters or whether she expected to receive any support at the DNC. Biden’s campaign also did not respond to a request for comment on this story. 

Carroll said that, in the event that Biden steps aside, he would vote for any candidate recommended by the president and he assumes that would be Harris. He also said there is “no universe” where he would vote to nominate Williamson at the DNC. 

“To be perfectly honest, I barely know who the hell she is,” Carroll said.

“I mean, I know that she’s got like crystals to sell or something, but like, I really, I couldn’t tell you if she walked into my office right now …I wouldn’t know that she was Marianne Williamson,” he continued, adding, “I don’t think of her as a Democratic Party person, I don’t think of her as an elected official, I don’t think of her as a party activist or somebody who has got her finger on the pulse. … I know she’s a kooky person, but I don’t spend — I’ve got too many things going on in my life to spend any time on kooky Marianne Williamson and what her ideas are.”