Clamor rises for Biden to step aside soon

The pressure is building for Joe Biden to drop out of the presidential race. Donald Trump leads Biden nationally in seven swing states, according to a recent poll from Emerson College. The New York Times ran a piece yesterday entitled: “Biden called ‘more receptive’ to hearing pleas to step aside.” Several top Democrats privately told Axios that the rising pressure will persuade president Biden to drop out of the race as soon as this weekend. Former president Barack Obama told “allies” that Biden should reconsider the viability of his candidacy, reports the Washington Post. Meanwhile, Biden tested positive for Covid — for the third time. He is currently isolated in his beach house in Delaware, and will not be attending in-person meetings for the next few days.

Joe Biden is still committed to running, however. In recent days, Biden has said he would stand down if “the Lord Almighty” tells him to, if he “had some medical condition that emerged,” if he gets “hit by a train,” or if the polls say there is “no way for him to win.” If you want to stretch it, two of those things have already happened, and depending on which God you believe in — three. However, the New York Times article has described a little flexibility in Biden’s thinking — the president is willing to listen to new polling data and continues to ask questions about whether vice president Kamala Harris could win.

The NYT piece also addressed Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s appeal to party leaders to hold off on the “role call” — the virtual finalizing of Biden as the Democratic nominee before the DNC as a way to go around an Ohio law — which is now planned for the first week of August instead of late July, right before the DNC on August 19.

“Many of us are perplexed that he continues to say he’s either tied or winning in the polls,” Democratic representative Jared Huffman told NYT. “We don’t understand what factual universe that is coming from.” Publicly, twenty members of the House and one senator have called on the president to withdraw, but many more have expressed concerns privately.

In response to the Axios piece about top Democrats believing Biden will drop out, former White House deputy press secretary TJ Ducklo tweeted: “Joe Biden is his party’s nominee. He’s the president of the United States. He’s running for reelection. Baseless conjecture from anonymous sources isn’t a scoop. Tonight a convicted felon will talk about how he’ll make people’s lives worse if he gains power. Let’s focus.” 

Part of Axios’s report addressed the feelings of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi: that Biden could destroy Democrats’ chances of taking back the House. Pelosi is also allegedly worried about donations drying up.

In public, Barack Obama has been virtually silent since his support of Biden following the debate. However, the Washington Post reports that “those familiar with the matter” have said Obama’s concerns about Biden’s candidacy have only grown deeper, and some of Biden’s aides have blamed Obama for not keeping the party united under the president’s re-election campaign. Obama’s former aids don’t have good things to say about Biden.

Nearly two-thirds of Democrats want Biden to withdraw from the presidential race, according to a poll published yesterday by the Associated Press.

When it comes to Joe Biden’s reelection, it’s turning into a fight between him, his wife Jill and his son Hunter against the whole Democratic Party. Only time will tell if some rest and relaxation with the fam at their beach house will assure him that he still has a chance of winning. Because until the president can be convinced — or shamed — into stepping down by more and more Democrats, he’ll be the nominee.