I agree it's not ideal, but i want to believe that Biden did not plan to quit until soon before he did, and this is not some plan to avoid open national primaries. Also, Kamala seems to be pretty strong candidate, so most people are not complaining and instead pledging support.
For a party that says they care about democracy so much, it's hard to understand why they refuse to have a primary or anything. Instead, they're just going to tell you who to vote for
The party nomination isn't official until the delegates vote at the convention. That isn't new. The nomination is never final until the convention.
The people voted in the state party primary. Biden and Harris were the incumbents on the Democratic party ticket. Joe Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed Vice President Harris as his replacement. If the party does not largely agree that Harris should be the new nominee, they will have an opportunity to vote for someone else at the convention.
For me this doesn't change anything. My vote was always going to be for the Democrat. Not because I love Democrats. I really don't. But because any other vote is basically a vote for the moron in the stupid hat, and I really don't want that.
In an interview I heard, a party official made it clear than anyone who would like to run for president needs 300 delegates' worth of support. That's out of over 4000 delegates. So realistically, if someone else wants to be considered, they need to convince less than 10% of delegates that they're worth a shot, then tell the party that... like this week.
It all has to be settled before Aug 7 because Ohio state officials (who happen to be republican) set a deadline prior to the dnc convention (presumably they set this deadline after the convention was scheduled...)
This is all more or less spelled out in black and white despite the unprecedented scenario.