President Joe Biden is putting on a good face after his disastrous and potentially election-killing debate against Donald Trump. The former president handily beat the man whose mental limitations and age were exposed on a national stage. The CNN moderators couldn’t help him either. Biden looked aloof, slow, and mentally gassed. He looked like a man who couldn’t do the job, and the polling reflected those sentiments.
Last weekend was the beginning of the drumbeat to replace the president. Top donors, activists, and top Democrats on the Hill were calling for Biden to step aside. Obama told allies that Joe’s path to victory was now even narrower and possibly closed after that disastrous debate. Regardless, 66 percent of Democrats want Biden to remain, though for most, it’s likely due to preventing more chaos than what has already transpired following the debate. Now, even with his “I’m not going anywhere” moment a la Wolf of Wall Street, the president is reportedly torn between sticking with it or standing down, the realization that his debate did irreparable damage ever-present, though between 10 am and 4 pm. Also, it sounds like a hostage situation of sorts (via NBC News) [emphasis mine]:
Joe Biden on the campaign call: pic.twitter.com/mSqMsZFoeM https://t.co/fdSxClSNgQ
— Carlos (@txiokatu) July 3, 2024
In recent conversations with aides, family members and allies outside the White House, President Joe Biden has vacillated between acceptance and defiance in the face of the seismic shift in his political standing within his own party, according to four people familiar with the matter.
In some discussions, Biden has acknowledged that the blowback from his debate performance last week may grow too large to overcome, while in others he’s been completely dismissive of any notion that he might walk away from his re-election campaign, these people said.
Some members of the president’s family — particularly first lady Jill Biden and their son Hunter Biden — are urging him to make changes to his staff and are increasingly conveying their views on his campaign’s strategy in an attempt to resuscitate his flailing campaign, three people familiar with the matter said.
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Biden family members have privately pointed fingers at some of the president’s longtime aides over his disastrous debate. They have discussed whether the president should fire senior White House adviser Anita Dunn, for instance, and possibly even her husband, Bob Bauer, who serves as Biden’s personal lawyer, two people familiar with the matter said.
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Members of the president’s family have been among the loudest voices rejecting any suggestion he drop out of the race, according to people familiar with the private discussions. Biden, too, is not inclined to withdraw, which he has stressed in public appearances. But he is weighing his own instincts to stay and fight — and his family’s reinforcement of those instincts — against the mounting calls for him to step aside and data showing the damage his debate performance did to his re-election prospects.
“He can see that there is potentially no real path,” one of these people said. “But he’s being pushed.”
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The president began engaging with leaders in the Democratic Party over the past few days as calls for him to step aside grew and anxiety among Biden allies escalated.
Former President Barack Obama’s counsel during a phone call this week, however, did not sit well with Biden, who still harbors resentment toward his former boss for advising him not to run for the White House in 2016.
Obama has privately questioned the notion that he could influence Biden on such a personal decision if party leaders determined the president needed to be convinced to exit the race, according to two people familiar with his comments.
Keep in mind, the reporting on Biden calling senior Democrats to shore up support makes it seem like this man doesn’t call congressional leadership often, if at all. Second, the Obama drama is popcorn-worthy. I think the two men falling out in 2016 caused a rift that might be unbridgeable. Obama sees Biden as not worthy of the office, not having that presidential timber to do the job, hence the country's state. He didn’t want Biden to run because he couldn’t do it, and that was when Biden wasn’t a sundowner-plus. Biden sees Obama probably more as a junior partner than an equal despite the latter handily winning his two elections; Biden isn’t seen as someone who truly won 2020. It’s just that Trump lost it.
In all, a campaign is being waged to push him out the door, Biden says he’s staying but mulling an exit, and the fence-sitting seems that this could break either way. Again, it’s hard to win a national race when 75 percent think you’re too old and feeble to do the job.
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