By ELENA SCHNEIDER | Politico
If anyone is going to challenge Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic presidential nomination, they have only until this weekend to do it.
Delegates to the Democratic National Convention rules committee approved the virtual roll call on Wednesday, moving ahead with a July 30 deadline for candidates seeking to collect delegate signatures to appear on the virtual roll call. The virtual roll call, which must be completed by Aug. 7 to comply with Ohio ballot access deadlines, could start as early as next Thursday.
The compressed timeline — nominating Harris less than two weeks after President Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential race — nearly guarantees the vice president’s path to the nomination, given the wide swath of support she’s picked up from Democrats across the country since declaring her candidacy on Sunday. She also benefits from the DNC pushing ahead on a virtual roll call that would conclude by Aug. 7, which the committee has defended as necessary to avoid potential legal challenges by Republicans in Ohio.