Ever heard of Dean Phillips? He’s that congressman from Minnesota. The one who’s challenging President Joe Biden in the Democratic primary. Name ring a bell?
The answer is probably no.
By this time next month, you might.
After the New Hampshire primary wraps up Jan. 23, Phillips told City Pulse his next stop is Michigan, the site of the Feb. 27 presidential primary … and it might be shortly after the polls close.
“You might be seeing me the next morning,” he said.
And once he’s here, the 54-year-old former head of his family’s distilling business (think Belvedere Vodka) said he’ll be spending “a better part of the next month” in the Great Lakes State.
“It’s probably the second-most important state in my strategy,” Phillips said.
The most important is the state he’s in now — New Hampshire. If he gets blown out there, the name “Dean Phillips” will probably evaporate into the ether of American politics.
But it might not. The Democratic Party mixed up its nomination selection process and put South Carolina ahead of Iowa and New Hampshire, traditionally the site of the first two selection contests.
New Hampshire is having its primary first anyway, and Biden’s name isn’t on the ballot. The president didn’t want to give credibility to the New Hampshire contest. Voters will need to write in “Biden” in order for it to count.
Phillips is on TV in the Granite State letting everyone know about it.
“Joe Biden has ordered New Hampshire to step aside. That’s not the New Hampshire way,” the voiceover on Phillips’ ad says.
There are no delegates at play in this primary. It’s a “beauty contest” through and through. But Phillips’ advisers are secretly hoping for 42% at the polls, according to POLITICO. What if that happens? Could he be the loser, yet come out a winner?
“New Hampshire is going to be the spark,” Phillips said. “New Hampshire has an extraordinary history of setting the tone for an entire presidential primary, and I think we will surprise.”
Two months ago, he was at 2% in the state’s polling. Today he’s at 10%, with two weeks to go.
The whole thing seems too preposterous to even be real. Some little-named congressman from Minnesota is going show well against an incumbent Democrat president in a New Hampshire primary?
Well, it’s happened before.
In 1968, U.S. Sen. Eugene McCarthy, another Minnesota Democrat, stunned pundits by managing 42% against unpopular President Lyndon Johnson, who received 48% in the New Hampshire primary. Three weeks later, with the Vietnam War weighing down the incumbent, Johnson uttered the infamous phrase that he would “neither seek nor accept” the Democratic nomination.
The Vietnam War was splitting up the Democratic Party in 1968. The war in Palestine is creating divisions today, but not to the degree of dissent Johnson faced, at least yet.
But Phillips says at least two issues are agitating voters: “costs and chaos.”
Many Americans are struggling to make ends meet amid inflation. Life is becoming too expensive. Inflation and the rising costs of goods are polling as the top issues for voters this year.
Americans also see “chaos” at the southern border, as scores of people — folks not even from Mexico, originally — cross the U.S.-Mexico border illegally in unprecedented numbers.
“People are feeling insecure economically and physically, and that’s exactly why I’m doing this,” Phillips said in an exclusive phone interview Monday.
That’s ONE of the reasons he’s doing this. He’s saying goodbye to his congressional career. He’s admittedly a seemingly impossible longshot.
But, as Phillips sees it, somebody must do it. President Biden was the right candidate in 2020. He’s not the right candidate in 2024. His numbers are terrible. Biden’s first-term favorability numbers equal those of Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush and Donald Trump, all of whom lost reelection, according to FiveThirtyEight.
Phillips is convinced Trump will beat Biden in a second head-to-head matchup. Biden surely couldn’t beat Nikki Haley if she somehow wins the GOP nomination, he added.
Though he didn’t bring it up in his interview with City Pulse, Phillips hasn’t been shy about pointing to Democrats’ unease about Biden’s age. A Wall Street Journal poll found that 73% of Democrats say that Biden, who is 80, is too old to run again.
“It is time for the torch to be passed to a new generation of American leaders,” Phillips declared when he officially announced his candidacy last September.
It doesn’t have to be him. He told HBO host Bill Maher he called Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and asked her to run.
She didn’t take the call. Phillips was left with the impression she’s waiting for 2028.
“I, on the other hand, intend to meet the moment, not to preclude anyone else from participating,” Phillips said. “I do hold your governor in the highest esteem. I’m disappointed that she and others didn’t recognize that this is the moment the country needs other candidates.”
Phillips said he hopes to meet Whitmer on the campaign trail. Unless they run into each other at the Senate Biggby, that’s probably not likely. Whitmer is “riding with Biden” as a campaign co-chair, after all.
He likely won’t get a warm reception from many in the Democratic establishment either.
The Michigan Democratic Party sent to Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson only Biden’s name as a primary candidate for 2024, even though Phillips and author Marianne Williamson are both running.
All three names were put on the ballot because state law requires all declared candidates “generally advocated by the national news media” to be put on the ballot.
Still, preliminary polling results this week from MIRS News show Phillips’ name ID in Michigan being very low.
“Who is this we’re talking about?” asked political consultant Alexis Wiley, former chief of staff to Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, when asked about Phillips’ plans for Michigan.
Democrats across the country have generally distanced themselves from Phillips, Williamson or anyone else who challenges Biden. Any shots fellow Democrats take against Biden only softens him up for Trump in November.
That’s the belief, anyway. Phillips doesn’t buy it.
“Political parties require you to stand in line, wait your turn, be quiet, follow the leader and do nothing to upset the mechanism, and I’d argue there is no more important time in our history to upset the mechanism,” Phillips said.
Upsetting the mechanism would mean to perform well in Michigan, and in-state political observers don’t see that happening.
Asked what type of impact he expects Phillips to have on the presidential primary, Grassroots Midwest CEO Adrian Hemond said, “Zero. His name ID is almost nonexistent. He has essentially no infrastructure here. If he gets 5% in our primary, it will be a minor miracle.”
The expectation is the sitting president will run away with the Michigan primary. Phillips is a challenge in name only, said Oakland University political science Professor Dave Dulio.
Even if Biden is not capable or unwilling to accept the Democrats’ nomination in August, Dulio expects Vice President Kamala Harris would be plugged into the role, not Phillips, unless he manages a large number of delegates … and even then.
“This is a battle less about ideas and more about incumbency,” Dulio said. “It’s a battle over who is better positioned to be the president — the person who has already done it once or the person nobody has heard of.”
Michigan does have a history of backing mavericks or underdogs in presidential primaries, though. Look at George Wallace over Hubert Humphrey and eventual nominee George McGovern in 1972. Jesse Jackson over Mike Dukakis in 1988. John McCain over George W. Bush in 2000. Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton in 2016.
The latter primary upset came after Clinton took Michigan for granted and the Sanders supporters worked hard to gobble up delegates, said Ed Sarpolus of Target-Insyght. Could Biden do the same in 2024?
But pundits who focus on the unlikelihood of a Phillips victory may be missing the point. Again, look at 1968, when Lyndon Johnson’s popular rating was about the same as Biden’s today: about 40%. Add to that a hypothetical: a strong showing by Phillips as a tool of Democrats’ disenchantment with Biden in Michigan at the end of February — especially if it follows even a decent showing by Phillips in New Hampshire and the national name recognition that will follow. Throw in concern down the ticket from Democrats running in 2024 who behind the scenes are already worried about what Biden’s candidacy at the top may cost them.
That would generate a lot of pressure on Biden to make a Johnson-esque declaration in order to help Democrats keep Donald Trump from winning a second term.
Phillips has some history in Michigan. When he worked in distilled spirits and with Talenti Gelato, the nation’s third-largest premium ice cream brand, he was in Michigan quite a bit, he said.
He said he used to call on Meijer supermarkets, for example. He said he saw a lot of similarities between Michigan and Minnesota. Both have a lot of lakes. Both have ice fishing. Both have at least one college in the Big Ten.
“You’ve got much more successful sports teams,” he quipped. “We’re never known in Minnesota for winning.”
It’ll take more than a Midwest connection to win the state, though, Sarpolus said. He’s going to need at least $3 million in airtime and Biden to check out after the primaries in South Carolina (Feb. 3) and Nevada (Feb. 6).
He’ll need to do it leaning on his own personal fortune.
He said he’s spent at least $2 million of his own money for lawyers to get him on ballots. Right now, he’s fighting decisions in North Carolina and Florida to reverse decisions barring him.
He disclosed a net worth of $64 million in 2018, which makes him one of the wealthiest members of Congress. His 2022 financial disclosure statement with the House was 13 pages long.
A former adviser recently formed a super PAC called Pass the Torch. A progressive watchdog group accused the Phillips campaign and Pass the Torch of illegally coordinating, something the Phillips campaign has denied.
To the extent campaign finance issues are a hurdle in 2024, this could be one.
Another potential hurdle for Phillips, who is Jewish, could be campaigning in Southeast Michigan, which has the highest percentage of Arab American voters in the country. With tensions between Israel, Palestinians and the Muslim world high, how does he plan to relate?
“My message is we’re brothers and sisters,” Phillips said. “I have great love and affection for the Arab community both here and around the world. I want everyone to know that I intend to be the first Jewish president in American history and the one who helps faciliate, for the first time, the creation of a Palestinian state.
“I think it’s time that we stop fighting each other and start fighting for one another,” he said.
On other issues, Phillips has voted in the past to ban automatic weapon sales. He doesn’t lead with that, though. Instead, he pivots to “having thoughtful conversations on gun control” … except when it comes to selling weapons to minors.
He said he doesn’t believe 18-year-old civilians who aren’t allowed to drink alcohol should be allowed to buy a military-grade, semi-automatic long gun with a high-capacity magazine.
Overall, Phillips is considered a moderate Democrat, along the lines of U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, the Democrat who represents Lansing. They are both members of the aisle-crossing Problem Solvers Caucus in the House.
While talking about issues, Phillips will talk about himself. His father, Artie Pfefer, was killed in the Vietnam War when Dean was 6 months old. Three years later, his mother, DeeDee Cohen, wed Eddie Phillips, who adopted him. His new dad’s mother was Pauline Phillips, known to the world as advice columnist Abigail Van Buren, whose syndicated newspaper column was called Dear Abby. And that makes his great-aunt the advice columnist Ann Landers, who in real life was the twin sister of Phillips’ famed grandmother.
His grandmother grilled him when he was 11 years old whether he was a Republican or a Democrat. When he didn’t answer right away … he was 11 … she told him he was a Democrat. That was that.
As an adult, Phillips visited the spot in the Pleiku province where his father’s helicopter crashed.
Phillips married Annalise Glick in 2019. He and his first wife, Karin Einisman, had two daughters who are now in college. One of his daughters, Pia Phillips, survived Hodgkin lymphoma while in high school. She’s been cancer-free for more than five years.
One of his daughters came out as a lesbian recently. Phillips belongs to the LGBTQ+ Equality Caucus in the House.
Phillips has talked openly about all his life experiences in the various podcasts and interviews he’s done since becoming a presidential candidate.
Maybe you’ll hear more about it — and about him — come Feb. 27. Maybe not.
It’s fine to be skeptical.
As Wiley, who has seen her share of political candidates, told City Pulse, “Can I say, ‘LOL?’ People should do what’s in their heart … . Who am I to squash somebody’s dreams, even if they won’t come true.”
But even if Phillips isn’t the Democratic nominee, even if he opens the door to another Democratic nominee, someone who defeats Donald Trump or whoever the Republican nominee is in 2024, Phillips will have considered this run a success.
Phillips is fine being a footnote in history, like fellow Minnesotan Eugene McCarthy. He has a company and a life outside of politics to fall back on after this campaign is over, wherever this journey ends up leading.
“This is not my past,” he said. “This will not be my future.”
(Email Kyle Melinn of the Capitol news service MIRS at melinnky@gmail.com.)
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