President Joe Biden announced that he will be dropping out of the 2024 presidential race on Sunday, weeks after a disastrous presidential-debate performance kicked off a public revolt within the Democratic party.
Biden posted a statement on X declaring his intention to drop out of the presidential race and acknowledging what dozens of Democratic lawmakers and prominent liberal pundits have been saying publicly since the late June debate: At 81 years old, he no longer represents the Democratic Party’s best chance to defeat former president Donald Trump this November.
“While it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and focus solely on my duties as president for the remainder of my term,” Biden said after touting his achievements.
“I will speak to the nation later this week in more detail about my decision.”
Moments after announcing his withdrawal, Biden released a statement endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him atop the Democratic ticket.
“My very first decision as the party nominee in 2020 was to pick Kamala Harris as my Vice President. And it’s been the best decision I’ve made. Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year. Democrats — it’s time to come together and beat Trump. Let’s do this,” Biden said on X.
Unlike other potential contenders for the Democratic nomination, Harris will be able to draw on Biden’s considerable war chest. If the party refuses to unite around her during a virtual roll call of delegates set to take place in the coming weeks, the Democratic National Convention in August could turn ugly, pitting ambitious members of the party’s next generation against one another as they vie for delegates on the convention floor.
Now a lame-duck president, Biden will serve the remaining months of his single presidential term. His political career, which has spanned five decades, will likely be defined by his decision to bow out of the presidential reelection contest.
Before stepping aside, Biden and his aides vigorously defended his mental acuity but failed to convince the public. Poll after poll found that most Americans believed Biden’s age presented a serious concern, and his decline became increasingly noticeable with each public appearance.
In February, special counsel Robert Hur observed Biden’s memory issues in his final report on the investigation into whether Biden had mishandled classified documents as a private citizen. Although Hur concluded that Biden “willfully” mishandled classified materials, he did not recommend criminal charges, in large part because he did not believe Biden was fit to stand trial.
When Hur’s report came out, Democrats leaped to his defense and claimed that Hur was a right-wing partisan who unnecessarily editorialized throughout the final report. Only after Biden’s horrendous debate showing last month did Democrats finally begin discussing publicly the problem posed by Biden’s advanced age.
Throughout the presidential debate, Biden coughed, stumbled over his words, lost his train of thought, whispered into the microphone, appeared outright confused, and rambled incoherently. Immediately, Democrats and their media allies began discussing the possibility of removing Biden from the presidential ticket. Leaks began pouring through the mainstream press, undeterred by the Fourth of July holiday celebration the week after the debate.
As pressure mounted on Joe Biden, his inner circle shrank to only a few trusted aides and family members, with troubled son Hunter becoming his father’s de-facto chief of staff and First Lady Jill Biden remaining her husband’s strongest advocate.
Biden tried to stem the tide with campaign rallies, prime-time interviews, and radio appearances, all of which simply added to the pressure on him to resign. Last week, at the end of the NATO summit in Washington, D.C., Biden delivered a high-profile press conference billed as a do-or-die moment for his political life. Although Biden stumbled, coughed, whispered, rambled, and slipped up, his performance at the press conference was not enough to serve as the final nail in the coffin.
More than two dozen Democratic lawmakers publicly called for Biden to drop out, and many others voiced concerns privately. Other top Democratic lawmakers leapt to Biden’s defense, especially those in the Congressional Black Caucus.
For a moment, the conversation around Biden was overshadowed by the failed assassination attempt against Trump, and the Republican National Convention that followed. Nonetheless, lawmakers continued calling for Biden to drop out, and leaks of private conversations among Democratic heavyweights kept apace.
Undeterred, a slew of Democratic lawmakers urged Biden to resign on Friday, the day after the GOP convention wrapped up, as Biden was isolated at his Delaware beach house following a positive Covid-19 test. His campaign surrogates continued to insist that he would return to the campaign trail and be the Democratic nominee.
The desire to replace Biden was not solely confined to Democratic power brokers, as a recent poll found that almost two-thirds of Democrats wanted a different presidential nominee. At the same time, swing-state polls found Biden’s deficit against Trump mounting, an issue that campaign chairwoman Jen O’Malley Dillon publicly acknowledged on Friday.
Biden won 99 percent of the party’s delegates in a largely uncontested primary contest against Representative Dean Phillips (D., Minn.) and author Marianne Williamson. It’s unclear who the Democratic nominee is going to be, but Harris is the presumptive favorite, especially with Biden’s endorsement. Next month, the Democratic convention is set to take place in Chicago, the site of its famously chaotic convention in 1968, and this time around, party infighting looms large again.
“The work that we must do now, while unprecedented, is clear. In the coming days, the Party will undertake a transparent and orderly process to move forward as a united Democratic Party with a candidate who can defeat Donald Trump in November,” Democratic National Committee chairman Jamie Harrison said in a statement addressing the party’s upcoming nomination process.
“This process will be governed by established rules and procedures of the Party. Our delegates are prepared to take seriously their responsibility in swiftly delivering a candidate to the American people.”
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