Who aspires to the US presidency in 2024 and what do they promise?

Although it is more than a year until November 2024, when the United States will decide who will be its next president, the race to occupy the White House is already in full swing.

As the primaries of the two most important parties in the country, the Republicans and the Democrats, approach, the field of candidates for the candidacies fills up with each passing day, with more announcements of personalities and politicians throwing their names into the ring.

Inflation, job creation, transparency, economic growth, social security, the right to abortion and migration are some of the main issues in these elections, marked by the intense polarization that exists in the US.

democrats

The campaign for the Democratic nomination remains clearer, with just three contenders, among whom the incumbent Joe Biden stands out in the polls, with Kamala Harris as his running mate.

Biden maintains a wide margin of advantage with a positive rate of 59.6% in the polls over the lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (16.8%) and the self-help guru Marianne Williamson (6.8%), according to RealClearPolitics.

Joe Biden

Biden announced his candidacy for re-election last April, when he asked voters to give him more time to “finish the job,” allaying questions within his own party about whether he would run. The 80-year-old president is the oldest person to have held the position and, if re-elected, he would be 86 years old at the end of his second term.

In this race, Biden will highlight the legislative achievements of his first term and more than 50 years of experience in Washington. His campaign will focus on making visible his work – which he intends to continue – to create more jobs, lower inflation, guarantee the economic and manufacturing independence of countries like China, ensure the path to clean energy transition and control the crisis on the southern border. opening more legal avenues to immigrate.

Analysts say it is highly unlikely that he will lose the Democratic Party nomination, a race in which he has no serious rivals.

Robert F Kennedy Jr.

The environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr., known in recent years for being one of the faces of the anti-vaccine movement, He also joined the ring in April for the Democratic nomination with a transgressive proposal, in which he promised to “end the corrupt fusion of state and corporate power” that wants to “impose a new type of corporate feudalism” in the US.

Son and nephew respectively of the late Robert F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy, the lawyer referred to both on more than one occasion during his initial speech.

Regardless of the weight of his last name, experts insist that he does not present a real threat to Biden due to his history with the anti-vaccine movement and his statements denying the veracity of the 2020 presidential election.

marianne williamson

Self-help writer Marianne Williamson was the first to open the race for the Democratic candidacy, in a new attempt to reach the White House, described as highly unlikely by analysts.

“We’re concerned about this country,” Williamson said at the start of the campaign, vowing to work to “create a vision of justice and love so powerful that it overrides the forces of hate.”

In 2020, this former spiritual adviser to Oprah Winfrey also sought the Democratic nomination, appealing more to the notoriety of her outlandish calls for spiritual healing than to a solid platform that could attract voters.

Republicans

The Republican field looks much less cloudless than the Democratic one. To date, 14 candidates have filed to lead the party’s 2024 campaign, of which 10 are considered serious contenders.

Former President Donald Trump leads the polls, according to RealClearPoliticswith 53.2% against emerging adversaries such as Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (22.4%), former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley (4.4%) and former Vice President and former Trump running mate Mike Pence (3.8%).

donald trump

The ex-president seems to be the contender to win in the Republican Party primaries and the target of the darts of several of the candidates for the nomination. Controversial and despite facing more than 30 criminal chargesTrump returned to the presidential race to seek a second term, while continuing to deny -without proof- the results that gave Joe Biden victory in 2020.

Under his now renewed slogan of “Let’s make America great again!”, Trump bases his campaign on harsh criticism of Biden, but also of opponents from his own party, along with promises of economic prosperity, fervent nationalism and a strong anti-immigration position.

If elected, the president has come to promise that on the first day of his presidency will sign an order to deny automatic citizenship to the “children of illegal immigrants” and end once and for all with the so-called “maternity tourism”, despite the fact that experts warn that the right, rooted in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, is protected and an action like this is leaves the jurisdiction of the Executive.

Mike Pence

Former Vice President Mike Pence, a former Indiana governor and former House Republican leader, is running for the Republican nomination against his former boss, Donald Trump. This is the first time in 83 years that a second-in-command has faced off against his former number one for the US presidency.

Pence, earned the animosity of Trump for refusing to reject the confirmation of Biden as winner in 2020 and harshly criticized the former president during the launch of his campaign, whom he questioned for encouraging the assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021 and his praise to Vladimir Putin.

Pence is presented as a more balanced alternative compared to Trump, although he maintains many of the policies espoused by the controversial tycoon.

Ron DeSantis

After months of speculation, Ron DeSantis, 44, presented his candidacy for the presidency in a conversation with Twitter CEO Elon Musk, with technical glitches preventing listeners from hearing the ad in real time, called a minor setback by his campaign team.

The Florida governor is seen by many, inside and outside the Republican party, as the main contender for Donald Trump, with whom he has engaged in an open exchange of mutual questioning, after dedicating only oblique criticism.

His platform is very similar to that of Trump, with whom he shares a strong stand against immigrationcriticism of what he calls “the extreme left” and a position against greater control of the use of weapons.

nikki haley

Republican Nikki Haley is betting on her experience as governor of South Carolina and her presence on the world stage as the Trump administration’s ambassador to the United Nations as credentials that could attract voters in her campaign for the presidency, which she bills as the generational change capable of recovering power for the party.

Haley, 51, is the daughter of Punjabi Sikh Indian immigrants and the only woman running for the Republican nomination, where she was the first to announce his candidacy, last February. Although he had been careful not to criticize his former boss, the ex-governor has questioned Trump and DeSantis for their refusal to say whether they want Ukraine to win the war against Russia.

chris christie

Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has said he is the only candidate in the field able to take on ex-president Trumpwhom she supported in 2016, when she lost the Republican nomination to him.

Christie charged against Trump, whom he accused of being a person “obsessed with the mirror, who never admits a mistake, who never admits a fault”, while accusing Joe Biden of being “doing the same thing, only on the other side ”.

Tim Scott

Tim Scott submitted his candidacy with more optimistic rhetoric than that of his conservative rivals, while maintaining the positions of most of his rivals

Scott, the only African-American Republican in the upper house of Congress, has said he intends to reduce public spending and restrict abortion, to the point that if elected president, he would sign a federal law to ban terminations of pregnancies after 15 weeks. .

Vivek Ramaswamy

Vivek Ramaswamy is a former pharmaceutical industry executive who entered the political arena as a member of an increasingly diverse Republican party. His proposal is rooted, as he has stated, in a deep sense of nationalism. At 37, he is the youngest contender for the presidency.

“We have completely lost our sense of civic pride, (…) And I think that many of our economic struggles and our foreign policy struggles begin with that loss of American identity, that loss of civic pride,” he said in a interview with NPR. Ramaswamy’s parents emigrated from India.

Asa Hutchinson

Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson launched his candidacy last April with a focus on getting the economy back on track, securing the border, fighting crime and defending US supremacy over China in terms of global leadership.

Hutchinson, seeks to stand out in the race as a “consistent conservative” and has highlighted his worth “in terms of experience, track record and leadership.”

Doug Burgum

North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum presented this week a campaign focused mainly on the economy. “We need a new leader for a changing economy,” he stated.

Burgum, a 66-year-old former executive, is a relative unknown outside his state, where he has implemented a series of conservative policies, including a law banning abortion at six weeks of pregnancy, even in cases of rape or incest, and another that blocks transgender women and girls from competing in sports.

Larry Elder

Conservative radio host turned Republican breakout star in the 2021 battle for California governor, Larry Elder, announced his candidacy in April.

“America is in decline, but this decline is not inevitable. We can enter a new American Golden Age, but we must elect a leader who can get us there. That is why I am running.” public on Twitter soon after.

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