2020 Dem primary without Biden or Bernie

[Roll Roons]

The two current frontrunners don't run for president due to age.

What happens next? Where do their supporters go? Do any candidates who didn't run in real life get in?

[libertpaulian]

We have a one-on-one battle between Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris.  Beto and Pete might stick around, though.

[Canis]

Warren vs Pete Race

[tonyreyes89]

I think Beto has a second wind and the final 4 are Warren, Harris, Beto, & Pete

[brucejoel99]

Warren wins.

[Left Wing]

John Kerry, Andrew Cuomo, Bob Casey Jr., Jeff Merkley and Terry Mcauliffe probably all run. I think Kerry or Cuomo would be the moderate everyone coalesces around before super Tuesday. I think Merkley or Warren probably wins the primary because this many moderates in the race would split the moderate vote more.

[BigVic]

Warren wins, just

[Amanda Huggenkiss]

Bennetslide

[Lechasseur]

Someone who didn't run IRL in 2020 runs and gets the nomination.

This field was weak. Had Biden not been in there, I think more people run.

[JoeyOCanada]

Warren just manages to win or Mayor Pete shocks everyone.

[NewYorkExpress]

We'd be talking about either Elizabeth Warren or Pete Buttigeig as the Democratic nominee right now.

Of course, I honestly think Sanders wasn't going to skip this race...and if Trump wins, and he's still healthy, he'll probably run in 2024 too.

[Grassroots]

Warren runs and wins easily, with Bloom taking a far second.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Harris' campaign would still ultimately be derailed well before it was non-viable by staff issues (which would have gotten more airing the longer she remained a frontrunner). Bloomberg would have entered in March as he'd planned to and gotten a lot of his worst press earlier in the race, though that might not play to his advantage because he'd also have gotten fewer early endorsements from panicking anti-Sanders/Warren politicians and he was enough bad press to last many more news cycles than any other candidate.

Warren would remain a frontrunner and get a pass from the left for her M4A pivot, though many of the Carvillesque folk who praised her in comparison to Sanders would be predicting the same electoral doom with her as the nominee. I think Merkley wouldn't have run - if Sanders wasn't running in 2020, he wasn't going to run at all, and Merkely could afford to wait a cycle or two to avoid a contest with a much more prominent progressive.

Eric Holder would probably have run and got nowhere.

Sherrod Brown might have run and in that case I bet it would have come down to him vs Warren, with him being the one to receive the eventual nomination. Without his presence in the race (and without the unlikely entrance of Al Gore), I think Warren is probably the most likely to win in a three-way contest against Bloomberg and Buttigieg (neither could unite the establishment wing as easily as Biden), though she would not be an odds-on favourite in a field of 27 (not counting any new participants in the absence of Biden and Sanders). If Cuomo had run, I could see him making it a 2 way fight between himself and Warren, but he'd have lost by more than his current polling would have you believe. It'd be a similar situation for Kaine or TMac (although their margins would probably be better than Cuomo's), and Kerry would flop hard. One of the greatest weapons in this primary was the idea of electability, and Kerry had a terribly weak claim to that after 2004.

[John King wannabe]

I see Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren coming off as the frontrunners. Kamala with a majority of old Obama-Biden and Clinton staff and Warren with Bernie Campaign Staff and ground game.

I do think it would be fought bitterly with Harris winning.

[President Biden Democrat]

I see Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren coming off as the frontrunners. Kamala with a majority of old Obama-Biden and Clinton staff and Warren with Bernie Campaign Staff and ground game.

I do think it would be fought bitterly with Harris winning.

This would likely never happen but if it did I agree it would be Warren vs. Harris. Harris would win the primary because she is more moderate than Harris and would tick of less moderates in the party.

[here2view]

I'd expect Warren to win.