Many officials, lawmakers and strategists within Biden’s own party increasingly believe his candidacy is unsustainable, and their private anxieties are slowly but surely leaking out into public view, interviews with more than 50 Democrats conducted this week showed.
A growing number of Democrats believe that the president’s remaining on the ticket jeopardizes his ability to hold on to the White House and threatens other candidates. An unusual clash is brewing between a defiant U.S. president who insists he will not abandon his reelection campaign and members of his party who are beginning to suggest he should.
“I’m becoming less and less confident that we can win this race,” Rep. Scott Peters, D-Calif., said in an interview. “If we know we’re going to lose, it would be foolish not to explore alternative avenues.”
Democratic Rep. Angie Craig of Minnesota on Saturday called on Biden to step down as the Democratic nominee. “I do not believe he can effectively campaign and defeat Donald Trump,” she said in a statement.
Lawmakers say they have been inundated with concerns about Biden’s candidacy from donors and voters. Many members of the Democratic National Committee, the White House’s political arm, have said they remain supportive of Biden, but rifts are emerging.
And in separate interviews on Friday, Democratic lawmakers, former Obama administration officials and a senior aide to a prominent Democratic governor privately described Biden’s stance on the campaign trail as “untenable.”
“It would be good for Biden to recognize that nobody is irreplaceable,” said Mark Lachey, a former first vice chair of the Michigan Democratic Party who has urged Biden to drop out of the race, which is effectively the only way to begin the process of changing the candidate at this point. “A lot of people would be very excited if someone else were to run as the Democratic nominee for president, and I think there’s an enthusiasm gap right now and that gap is widening.”
To be sure, many leading Democrats have publicly voiced their support for the president or stayed silent about their concerns, but one senior White House official who worked with Biden on the president, vice president and 2020 campaign said in an interview Saturday morning that Biden should not seek reelection.
The official said that after observing Biden privately, in public and on trips with him, they no longer believe the president has the power to campaign vigorously and defeat President Donald J. Trump. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to keep his job, said Biden has shown steady signs of aging in recent months, speaking slower, more haltingly and quieter and appearing more fatigued in private.
White House press secretary Andrew Bates pointed to comments made by Biden in an interview with ABC News on Friday in which he vowed to continue campaigning.
In that interview, Biden also defended his acumen and ability to serve.
Democratic Party insiders have for years largely confined concerns about Biden’s age and competency to hushed conversations, while many voters have been vocal about their misgivings about nominating someone who will be 86 at the end of his second term. But since the first presidential debate in June and a campaign that some Democrats described as weak damage control, those whispered worries have turned into a whirlwind of action, with no clear direction.
Many Democrats who think Biden should withdraw from the race have emphasized their personal affection and respect for him and expressed deep sorrow.
Still, donors are bankrolling private polls to gauge potential alternatives to Biden. Other lawmakers are debating whether and when to publicly break with the president, with one Democratic strategist close to moderates predicting “the dam will break” when lawmakers return to Washington next week.
And at least one recent advocate has openly expressed concern.
Former Georgia lieutenant governor and Republican Geoff Duncan campaigned for Biden the day before the debate as part of his push back against Trump.
But Duncan said Friday that “the debate was a major awakening for me about President Biden’s mental and physical health,” and that “it would take a significant amount of refutation to clarify what I saw and heard in the debate. At this point, that is an unlikely scenario.”
And a new effort is underway to organize delegates ahead of the party’s August convention to show rank-and-file Democrats want a different candidate, said one activist, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the nascent campaign.
The push is being driven by a new group called “Pass the Torch,” which is also driving a petition calling on Democrats more broadly to call for Biden to step down. Before speaking at a rally in Wisconsin on Friday, a man standing near the president held up a sign with the slogan “Pass the Torch, Joe.”
Biden said he had no intention of doing so.
During a speech in Wisconsin, the president struck a defiant tone, saying no one could “press” him to withdraw. “Let me be very clear: I am continuing my campaign,” he declared.
He repeated those comments in an interview with ABC News on Friday and is scheduled to campaign in Pennsylvania on Sunday.
“President Biden knows better than anyone that a campaign is all about earning the trust and support of voters,” Biden spokesman Kevin Munoz said in a statement. “He’s on the campaign trail, traveling state by state with voters who will decide the outcome of our election. There are many days until Election Day, but the hard work of counting every single vote is far from over.”
Biden’s family has a lot of influence over his decision-making, and after the debate they urged him to continue in the race. The decision is effectively his alone: If he stepped aside, he would almost certainly have to remove his delegates so they could endorse another candidate.
Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware, a longtime Biden ally, said the president participated in a conference call with his campaign co-chairs on Saturday that turned a planned 15-minute check-in into a 75-minute presidential-led discussion, during which Biden used the time to solicit feedback from them about his performance at the debate, the Wisconsin rally and in an ABC News interview.
“None of the co-chairs are recommending anything other than continuing,” said Coons, who said the group shared with Biden messages from supporters who wanted him to continue, as well as those urging him to withdraw.
“The president was informed that some senators, congressmen, governors and especially donors have unanswered questions, fears and concerns,” Coons said.
Biden told the group he understands the concerns and is open to doing more interviews and unscripted appearances going forward.
Some of Biden’s advisers suggested the focus on the president’s age and his performance in the debates was of concern only to donors, the press and pundits. They pointed out that the campaign’s small-dollar fundraising remains strong and many Democrats continue to publicly highlight their support for Biden and campaign.
But polls, including one conducted after the debate by The New York Times and Siena College, show a majority of voters believe Biden is too old to serve another term as president.
Georgia State Rep. Lowa Roman urged Democrats to pay attention.
“I’m really concerned because I don’t think people are listening,” she said, but stopped short of calling for Biden to step down. “But I think it’s worth making sure that we’ve thought about it, talked about it, seriously considered it and done our due diligence, so that come November we can honestly say that we’ve done everything we can.”
In interviews with dozens of leading Democratic National Committee activists, many said they fully support Biden, that in their view the election is still a choice between him and Trump, and that they have no intention of reconsidering their options.
“I’m glad to see President Biden at the top of the list of candidates,” said Virg M. Rollins, chairman of the Democratic National Committee’s Congressional Black Caucus. “I would prioritize a wheelchair-bound President Biden over a convicted felon.”
Jonathan Seidel, a committee member from Philadelphia, said he thought Biden’s ABC News interview went better than the debate, but he said he would still support Biden even if it hadn’t, arguing that this election is more about convincing voters of the dangers of Trump than the merits of the current president.
“What I tell people is, there’s no Jesus or Moses on the list,” Seidel said. “Nobody is perfect.”
Other Democrats expressed caution about embarking on the unpredictable and cumbersome process of searching for a new nominee with less than four months until Election Day. There is also no unanimity over whether the party should immediately rally behind Vice President Kamala Harris in that hypothetical scenario if Biden leaves office or pursue an open nomination process — tensions that could come to the surface in the coming weeks.
Several Democratic National Committee members pointed to a proposal circulated by longtime committee member James Zogby to establish a more open nominating process in that scenario, evidence that some, even within the most supportive party organizations, are openly considering other contingencies.
“We hope and believe that if President Biden were to leave office, the process for replacing top nominees will be fully transparent while strengthening the grassroots base of support,” said committee member Jeri D. Shepherd of Colorado.
David Walters, a former governor of Oklahoma and member of the Democratic National Committee, has expressed concern since the debate, citing Biden’s polling.
“The only question that matters,” he wrote in a July 4 email to The New York Times, “is who is the best candidate to stop Donald Trump?”
He praised Biden’s legislative accomplishments and foreign policy skills, and said that if the president leaves office, “he will be applauded by the world for the personal sacrifices he has made for our country.”
“In politics and campaigns, perception is more important than reality,” Walters said. “He may be operating at 100 percent capacity, but 14 months into an 18-month campaign, the campaign is losing this argument.”
Reid J. Epstein and Katie Rogers Contributed report.
