Democratic strategists and party insiders say President Biden’s response to the post-debate crisis hurt his chances of beating former President Trump in November as much as his disastrous performance during the debate itself.
They say Biden cannot change the situation much without dropping out of the race. This view is shared by the majority of Democratic senators and a enormous portion of Democratic representatives in the House of Representatives.
Biden’s blunder met at the NATO summit and in Interviews with George Stephanopoulos and Black entertainment televisionThe dwindling support from media giants like MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and the deepening divisions within the Democratic Party have only reinforced the prevailing view that Biden cannot beat Trump.
Growing pessimism about Biden’s candidacy has sparked a up-to-date wave of calls from Democratic lawmakers for him to drop out of the race to avoid a potential disaster in November.
Democratic strategists say those calls will multiply and grow louder over the next week if Biden remains in the race after the weekend.
And they warn that Biden’s fundraising, which suffered a significant setback this month, will continue to decline, putting the president in an increasingly arduous position to mount a comeback against Trump in the polls.
A Democratic strategist close to a congressman who had urged Biden to reassure Democratic voters that he could win in November said Biden’s campaign had failed to show a clear path to victory.
“Everyone has been saying we need to see more, and frankly the last two weeks have been worse than the actual debate in many ways because they haven’t come up with a plan and they haven’t implemented it,” the source said.
The strategist said Biden was considered an underdog early in the race, but his prospects of victory dropped rapidly after the debate and fell even further after the assassination of Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, which united Republicans and had a mobilizing effect on their voters.
The source said that “a big part of it is the money” and warned that “donors aren’t just freezing out the Biden campaign, they’re locking everyone out,” noting that not only have major donors been holding back on contributions, but “online money is slowly flowing.”
Democratic senators and House members said last week that Biden’s exclusive interview with Stephanopoulos shortly after the debate was of little consequence and included several embarrassing moments, such as when Biden could not remember for sure whether he had watched a recording of the debate afterward and dodged questions about whether he would undergo an independent cognitive evaluation.
Then, at the NATO summit, Biden mistakenly referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as “President Putin” before realizing his error, and just hours later he mistakenly referred to Vice President Harris as “Vice President Trump.”
Another embarrassing slip-up occurred during an interview with Black Entertainment Television, when Biden apparently had difficulty remembering the name of his Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, and referred to him simply as “black.”
The strategist said Biden has failed to change the minds of his Democratic critics about his suitability for office over the past three weeks.
“He can’t possibly win and he has to come to that conclusion himself, and it sounds like he’s doing that,” the source said. “You’re hearing from voters, you’re hearing from donors who have asked the campaign, ‘What’s your path to victory?’ and they don’t have one.”
After meeting with senior Biden campaign officials last week, Democratic senators expressed dissatisfaction with their arguments for why Biden should remain the party’s nominee.
The advisers, campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon and senior advisers Mike Donilon and Steve Ricchetti, argued that Biden was “in the zone” to be competitive in the swing states, pointing to a Washington Post/ABC News poll showing a national tie between Biden and Trump.
But since then, the president’s poll numbers have worsened.
A Poll by the AP/NORC Center for Public Affairs The study, released Thursday, showed that two-thirds of Democrats believe Biden should drop out of the race. And it found that six in 10 Democrats believe Harris would do a good job as their party’s presidential candidate.
A CBS News/YouGov poll The poll released Thursday showed that Trump is now 5 points ahead of Biden nationwide, while an Emerson College poll showed that the former president Lead in seven swing states.
A second veteran Democratic strategist said Biden has suffered further political damage almost daily since the debate, as a growing number of Democratic lawmakers and donors have called on him to abandon his re-election bid.
“Every day that goes by like this is bad. I think we’re at a point now where the post-debate period is worse than the debate itself,” the source said.
The strategist said Biden’s “brain lapses” are “just getting worse.”
“The president should be glad it’s summer and Saturday Night Live isn’t on every week,” the adviser added.
Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.) said Friday that Biden is “weighing” the question of which Democratic candidate has the best chance of beating Trump.
“I think our president is weighing what he should be weighing, which is: Who is the best candidate to win in November and to carry the values and priorities of the Democratic Party forward in this election campaign?” Coons said at the Aspen Security Forum.
And he strongly disagreed with Democratic voices that Biden has not done enough to address concerns about his candidacy, citing the president’s leadership of the NATO conference in Washington last week and his exacting campaign schedule.
“He chaired … meeting after meeting, three days of the NATO summit – the strongest NATO summit ever – held a press conference, held campaign events, held campaign rallies, and yet there are people who say he is not strong enough or capable enough to be our next president. I disagree,” he said.
But Biden’s comeback attempt did not go as well as many Democrats had hoped.
During a conference call last weekend, he got into a tense exchange with Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) after Crow asked whether concerns about Biden’s age, health and mental fitness posed a national security risk.
“I don’t want to hear that crap,” Biden replied angrily.
Biden vented his frustration with NBC anchor Lester Holt in another exclusive interview that his campaign strategists hoped could reset the situation.
When Holt noted that Biden appeared confused at times during the debate with Trump, Biden criticized the media for not more thoroughly fact-checking Trump’s “28 lies” on the debate stage.
At one point, the president exclaimed angrily, “What’s wrong with you guys? Come on, man,” he said.
And although Biden has held several rallies and a press conference in Washington and given several one-on-one interviews, he has not thrown himself into the maelstrom of unforeseen situations over the past two and a half weeks in the way that some Democratic critics on Capitol Hill had imagined.
Democratic Rep. Greg Landsman of Ohio had for days held off on calling on Biden to resign. On Friday, he said he had finally come to the conclusion that the president was “no longer the best person” to convince the American people that Trump should not be elected and that Republicans should not be allowed to take control of Congress.
By Friday afternoon, three Democratic senators and at least 30 Democrats in the House of Representatives had called on Biden to drop out of the race.
Ten Democrats in the House of Representatives took part in this call on Friday alone — Representatives Zoe Lofgren (California), Jared Huffman (California), Marc Veasey (Texas), Mark Pocan (Wisconsin), Betty McCollum (Minnesota), Kathy Castor (Florida), Jesús “Chuy” García (Illinois), Gabe Vasquez (New Mexico), Sean Casten (Illinois) and Landsman.
Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) Biden called on on Thursday evening, and Senator Martin Heinrich (DN.M.) did that on FridaySenator Peter Welch (D-Vermont) and Representative Adam Schiff (D-California), the Democratic candidate for the Senate in California, have also called on Biden to resign.
Biden returned to Delaware to isolate after testing positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday following an event in Las Vegas.
