July 10, 2024, 4:38 p.m. ET (NYTimes.com)
George Clooney, a Biden fund-raiser, and Representative Pat Ryan, a vulnerable New York Democrat, said President Biden should step aside. Representative Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker and a longtime ally, appeared to ignore Mr. Biden’s insistence he’s running and said he must decide soon.
July 10, 2024, 4:01 p.m. ET38 minutes ago38 minutes ago
Pelosi is the most senior Democrat to signal he could still drop out. Here’s the latest.
President Biden on Wednesday faced a fresh wave of pressure to end his campaign or rethink his decision to run for re-election, as Democrats from Hollywood to Capitol Hill aired grave concerns that he is set to lose to former President Donald J. Trump in November and drag his party’s chance of controlling Congress down with him.
Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the former House speaker and a longtime Biden ally, gave the strongest public signal yet that Democrats are still divided on Mr. Biden’s insistence that he is staying in the race, saying that “time is running short” for him to make a decision.
Speaking on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Ms. Pelosi, 84, said that she would back Mr. Biden, “whatever he decides.”
Mr. Biden, 81, has said his mind is made up about continuing his campaign and scheduled a sit-down interview for Monday with NBC News, his second major network interview since his poor debate performance last month. He has called on Democrats to come together behind him.
Hours after Ms. Pelosi’s comments, Representative Pat Ryan of New York, one of the most vulnerable Democratic incumbents, said Mr. Biden should drop out “for the good of the country,” becoming the eighth House Democrat to publicly do so.
And George Clooney, the Hollywood actor who last month hosted a $28 million fund-raiser in Hollywood for Mr. Biden, added his voice to the calls for the president to end his candidacy, saying in a New York Times guest essay that he had seen Mr. Biden’s decline up close. “It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fund-raiser was not the Joe ‘big F-ing deal’ Biden of 2010,” he wrote.
But Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, who campaigned for Mr. Biden in several swing states over the weekend, reiterated at a news conference that he remains “all in” with the president. “The support on the ground was demonstrable,” he said. “That’s where I am. That’s where I stand.”
Even so, the drumbeat of skepticism about Mr. Biden’s viability among lawmakers, donors and party officials has only grown louder. His defiant public refusals to withdraw early this week appeared to freeze many Democrats in place, sapping momentum for a mass move to push him aside, but they hardly rallied nervous Democrats around his candidacy.
Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, on Wednesday told reporters: “I am deeply concerned about Joe Biden winning this November.” He said the party had to “reach a conclusion as soon as possible” while still reiterating that he supported Mr. Biden.
Senator Peter Welch, Democrat of Vermont, said that his hope was that “the concerns that are being expressed are being heard, even if not yet acknowledged.”
He added: “I want him to look at the evidence and make a hard decision. He’s earned that.”
Here’s what to know:
- Democrats remain divided: Ms. Pelosi’s comments appeared designed to give alarmed Democrats, who so far are mostly falling in line behind Mr. Biden, space to pivot in the coming days given the deep divide inside the party about whether his candidacy is viable. But the former speaker quickly moved to walk back any suggestion that she was suggesting that he leave the race. “The president is great, and there are some misrepresentations of what I have said,” she said in a statement to The New York Times. “I never said he should reconsider his decision. The decision is the president’s. I don’t know what’s happened to The New York Times that they make up news. It isn’t true.” Later in the day, she told ABC News that she thought Mr. Biden could win in November. The logistics of replacing him grow more difficult by the day.
- Fears of a G.O.P. landslide: Senator Michael Bennet, Democrat of Colorado, said in an interview with CNN on Tuesday night that he did not think Mr. Biden could beat Mr. Trump — although he stopped short of publicly urging Mr. Biden to end his campaign. “I think we could lose the whole thing,” Mr. Bennet said, warning of a “landslide” in the presidential race and referring to both chambers of Congress. He added, “The White House has done nothing since the debate to demonstrate they have a plan to win this election.”
- Today on the trail: Mr. Biden met with union leaders at the A.F.L.-C.I.O. who remain concerned about his candidacy, and foreign dignitaries in Washington a day after delivering a forceful speech to NATO allies. He was also set to meet with Keir Starmer, the newly elected British prime minister, in the evening. Vice President Kamala Harris addressed a sorority convention in Dallas, where she attacked Mr. Trump, saying he had “openly vowed that if re-elected he’ll be a dictator on Day 1.” Mr. Trump has no campaign stops scheduled.
- ABC anchor apologizes: The ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos was surreptitiously recorded on Tuesday saying that he did not believe that Mr. Biden could handle another term in office. Mr. Stephanopoulos publicly apologized later, saying he shouldn’t have “responded to a question from a passerby.”
- A projection edges Republican: The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan election forecaster, moved Electoral College projections in six states in Mr. Trump’s direction. Arizona, Georgia and Nevada went from “toss-up” to “lean Republican.” Minnesota, New Hampshire and Nebraska’s Second Congressional District went from “likely Democrat” to “lean Democrat.”
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July 10, 2024, 4:38 p.m. ET1 minute ago1 minute ago
Jon Lovett, a speechwriter for President Barack Obama when he was in office and co-host of the “Pod Save America” podcast, wrote on X that by staying in the race, President Biden was risking his reputation “as one of the greatest presidents in our lifetimes, who defeated Trump” and might instead be remembered as “a stubborn old man who allowed hubris and insecurity to destroy his legacy and perhaps our democracy with it.”
https://twitter.com/jonlovett/status/1811086031531495457?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1811086031531495457%7Ctwgr%5E74ccf74f4a18960ef511e0cba312a7acc603a4c3%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2Flive%2F2024%2F07%2F10%2Fus%2Fbiden-trump-election
July 10, 2024, 4:03 p.m. ET36 minutes ago36 minutes ago
Katie Hobbs, the Democratic governor of the battleground state of Arizona, told local reporters today that President Biden “can do the job.” But she acknowledged that Arizonans “have been concerned about the president’s age,” especially since the debate. “And I think the president has a lot to do to assure Arizonans and Americans.”
UPDATE Arizona's @GovernorHobbs goes beyond her comments on Biden 12 days ago, acknowledges voter's doubts: "The president has a lot to do to assure Arizonans and Americans." Swing state Dem gov hopes to flip Leg from R to D control in November. https://t.co/d1taeo2CWM pic.twitter.com/Qu3mry5Xw2
— Brahm Resnik (@brahmresnik) July 10, 2024
