The Democratic National Committee has faced criticism over the past few weeks as it became clear that the Democratic Party would not hold primary debates in the run-up to the 2024 presidential election and would fully support Joe Biden in his bid for a second term.

The controversy came to the fore as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Marianne Williamson announced their intent to run against the incumbent in the Democratic Party primary, with Kennedy doing remarkably well in early polls.

The corporate press argues that an absence of primary debates for the party of the incumbent has long been the norm. Kennedy's uncle, Sen. Ted Kennedy, who challenged incumbent President Jimmy Carter in the 1980 election, did not debate Carter. Nonetheless, Carter won 10,043,016 of the popular vote and Kennedy posed a serious challenge with 7,381,693 votes by Democrats.

It was part of a history of multiple, vigorous, primary challenges to incumbents in recent decades, as reported by Time in 2020. Although it's normal for a party to back their incumbent, Biden is remarkably weak and the candidacy of RFK Jr. is particularly strong so far. In a democratic system, Democratic voters would be allowed to make a choice.

In an NBC poll, 70 percent of respondents and 51 percent of registered Democrats didn't want to see Biden run again, with age being the most highly cited issue. If Biden were to be reelected, he would be 86 years old on leaving office. Even The New York Times admits DNC loyalists are, at best, hesitant to support Biden's 2024 bid.