President Biden has stepped aside. Here’s what happens now

President Biden announced he is stepping aside and has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him at the top of the ticket, putting an end to weeks of Democratic alarm following his disastrous debate performance against former President Donald Trump last month.

Harris said in a statement that she plans to earn and win the Democratic party’s nomination, with just one month remaining before the party convention in Chicago.

All of this sets off a series of events not seen in more than 50 years. If another Democrat steps up to challenge Harris, the party could be headed for an open convention, which could go to multiple rounds of voting.

Much depends on whether Democrats – and more importantly, the 4,700 or so convention delegates – coalesce behind a single candidate before they convene on August 19.

What happens if there's a competitor for Harris

If there are serious competitors for Harris, the convention would be preceded by something resembling a highly accelerated primary campaign where the voters being wooed are the delegates. The delegate voting process is spelled out in Democratic party rules.

“Think of it as a redo of the primary system in a very, very, very compressed period of time,” said Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a Democratic National Committee member and a delegate herself. She spoke to a group of delegates about the potential process on Friday.

She suggested the candidates would name their intended running mates.

But Kamarck told delegates that she was skeptical there would be a contest, because of the tight timelines. “The problem is we are really up against the clock. This is a month,” she told delegates on a Zoom on Friday.

Under DNC rules, requests to nominate