Democratic anxiety about whether President Biden should be able to run for reelection erupted into open air on Tuesday with growing panic, as a sitting member of Congress became the first to call on Biden to withdraw, with many other prominent government figures who have supported the president also voicing their concerns.
One Democratic senator publicly called on the White House for assurances about Biden’s “condition.” “This is really unusual, this is not how he’s been lately,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island told a local television station, saying he was “horrified” by Biden’s performance in the presidential debate.
Another senator, Vermont Sen. Peter Welch, in an interview with Semaphore, accused the Biden campaign of “taking a contemptuous stance toward people who raise questions for the sake of debate.”
And later that day, Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas, a veteran progressive lawmaker, issued a statement saying he had hoped Biden’s performance in the debate would give the president momentum to make up for his weakness against former President Donald J. Trump, but that it had instead disqualified him from running again.
“We had hoped that the debate would be the catalyst for changing that, but it didn’t happen,” Doggett said. “Far from reassuring voters, the president failed to effectively defend many of his accomplishments and expose many of Trump’s lies.”
The vast majority of Democrats, including party leaders, still publicly support Biden, and the few critics who have voiced concerns so far are not major figures with large followings within the party. Still, after days of privately fretting about Biden’s awkward, stumbling performance in last weekend’s debate, by Tuesday a growing number of Democrats seemed to be voicing their dissatisfaction.
It was a remarkable reversal that came just one day after the president delivered a prime-time address to the nation in an attempt to allay concerns about his ability to speak publicly.
White House officials, rattled by pressure from Biden’s own camp, were considering sending Biden to battleground states — Wisconsin on Friday and Pennsylvania on Sunday — to force him to do what allies have been pushing for: more time for him in public. They also considered having Biden meet on Wednesday with Democratic governors, many of whom have not had any direct contact with the president since the debate, stoking resentment among those who have yet to hear him speak.
Much of the anxiety among lawmakers, strategists and activists stems from a two-fold fear: That Biden will blunder and not only lose the White House, but also that Democrats will fail to win crucial elections that will determine control of both houses of Congress, thus losing a crucial check on Trump’s power.
“He obviously understands,” Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Illinois, told CNN on Tuesday, “that his decision will affect not only who serves in the White House for the next four years, but who serves in the Senate, who serves in the House, and will have implications for decades to come.”
Many Democratic offices in Congress have reported being inundated with calls from constituents urging them to ask Biden to resign. Doggett said in an interview that the calls and messages he’s received from constituents and supporters were “10-to-1” in favor of Biden resigning. Another person said the messages were split evenly between voters who wanted Biden to resign and those who think he’s fit for the job.
And it’s clear that Republicans intend to use questions about Biden’s mental competency and fitness to hold office as a weight to hang around the neck of weaker Democrats.
The day after the debate, Republican trackers (agents who film candidates and ask them politically risky questions) followed frontline Democratic congressmen as they returned to their districts and posed the same question: “Is Joe Biden fit to be president?”
“Joe Biden teeth “The President, you Is he fit to be president?”
But privately, many Democrats have deep reservations. Democrats in congressional races across the country have long understood that they need to outperform Mr. Biden to win seats. In that sense, several party officials working on congressional races said Mr. Biden’s performance will have little impact on their strategy.
For example, Maine Democratic Rep. Jared Golden, who represents a district won by Trump in 2020, said in an opinion piece on Tuesday that he has always believed Trump would win the November election, saying, “I’m OK with that.”
“Maine’s representatives must work with him when it benefits Mainers, hold him accountable when it does not, and operate independently and bipartisan no matter what,” Golden wrote.
In two statements from the Democratic House and Senate campaign headquarters, spokespeople emphasized that the congressional race is a “battle between candidates,” as Senate campaign communications director David Bergstein put it.
But Biden’s debate performance has raised a new wave of questions about his age and mental health, casting a pall over lesser Democratic candidates.
“It’s notable that the most important Senate candidates have big leads over the president in Nevada and other parts of the country,” Doggett said in an interview. “But without a more vigorous and effective campaign, we could end up with Republicans taking control of both houses of Congress. Even if Republicans take control of one of the houses, there’s a concern that they won’t be able to check Trump at all.”
Doggett said he believes Democrats are well positioned to win control of the House, “but when you look at it state by state, the margins are going to be slim in the best of circumstances, which is why we need all the help we can get from on high.”
So far, leading Democrats have voiced strong support for Biden, with Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York saying in a speech in Syracuse on Tuesday that he believes the president is fit for the job.
“I’m for Joe Biden,” he said.
House of Representatives Democrat Nancy Pelosi, a former speaker and California Democrat, said Tuesday it was “legitimate” to ask whether Biden’s stumble during the debate was a momentary lapse or a “medical condition,” but added that Trump should answer the same questions about falsehoods he has made.
“I think it’s a legitimate question to ask whether this is an episode or whether this is a symptom,” Pelosi said in her first extended remarks since Biden’s halting, incoherent speech during the debate.
“It’s fair for people to ask that question of either candidate,” she added. “What we saw was the other side lying.”
(A spokesperson later volunteered that Pelosi has “full confidence” in Biden and looks forward to attending the inauguration in January 2025.)
But at least one prominent Democrat who supports Biden raised questions about his withdrawal for the first time. Rep. James E. Clyburn of South Carolina, whose support for Biden helped secure the Democratic nomination in 2020, said he would support Vice President Kamala Harris if the president leaves office.
“If Biden steps down, I’ll support her,” Clyburn said on MSNBC on Tuesday, but added, “I hope that the pairing remains the Biden-Harris pairing.”
In private meetings, Democratic leaders have advised politically weaker candidates to do what they think is best for their races, whether that means defending Biden or distancing themselves from him, according to people familiar with the discussions.
As a result, many frontline Democrats are facing questions about Biden’s ability to project independence to voters in their districts. Rep. Marie Grusenkamp Perez, a first-time Democrat elected to a largely rural Washington district, told a local television station on Tuesday that she had watched the debate “five very painful minutes” and that “he will lose to Trump.”
And Adam Frisch, the Colorado Democratic candidate who nearly unseated Rep. Lauren Boebert in 2022, has called on Biden to step down.
“Panic is not a helpful emotion, but neither is denial,” said John Avlon, a Democrat running against a Republican incumbent on Long Island. “President Biden had a bad debate, but his track record is good. This is a legitimate debate that Democrats should be having, and it’s a sign of a healthy political party.”
That puts Democrats running in battleground states such as Wisconsin and Arizona, where Biden has been campaigning aggressively, in an especially tricky position.
“I’m focused on my campaign, I’m not a pundit,” Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio, told reporters last week when asked whether Biden should consider stepping down.
Matt Cartwright, a veteran politician who represents Biden’s hometown of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and is seen as one of the House Democrats most vulnerable to re-election this year, told reporters on Capitol Hill the day after the debate that it would be a “big leap” for Biden to leave office.
But Cartwright must navigate a tricky political landscape in which he faces the risk of being ousted by an unpopular incumbent president in his own district. He declined to be interviewed but stressed in a statement that he is a man who sticks to his own path.
“The president had a tough night, but I’m fighting a different fight in my community,” Cartwright said. “The people of Northeast Pennsylvania know me. They know I’m here to provide good paying jobs, lower prescription drug prices and stand up for our rights.”
His opponent, Rob Bresnahan, was happy to try to link his opponent to a “weakened president.”
“He’s past his prime, and it’s obvious,” Bresnahan said of Biden in the interview. “Everybody sees that he’s our leader. He’s our president. And Congressman Cartwright is voting for this guy almost 100 percent. It’s like the blind leading the blind.”
Some Democrats believe that if Biden continues to run behind Trump in the polls or falls further behind, the party and its big donors will simply focus their money and energy on holding the Senate and retaking the House rather than fighting for the presidency.
That’s how Republicans handled the 1996 election, in which presidential candidate Bob Dole lost by a large margin. Republican efforts allowed them to maintain control of Congress and thwart a second term for Bill Clinton, just as Democrats hoped for a second Trump administration.
“Democrats may say, ‘If we don’t get it right, we stand to lose everything,'” said Steve Jarding, a veteran Democratic political strategist and former lecturer at the Harvard Kennedy School, “and the American people seem to like divided government.”
Luke Broadwater, Maggie Haberman, Maya C. Miller and Aishwarya Kavi Contributed report.
