WASHINGTON DC: US President Joe Biden abandoned his tentative reelection bid on Sunday, amid growing opposition from within his own Democratic Party, and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his replacement as the party’s nominee against Republican Donald Trump.
Biden, 81, said in a post on X that he will remain president and commander in chief until his term expires in January 2025 and that he will address the nation this week.
“It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your President. And while it is my intention to seek re-election, I believe it is in the best interests of my party and the country for me to resign and focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term,” Biden wrote.
His initial statement did not include an endorsement of Harris, but minutes later he expressed his support.
Biden’s campaign was on the ropes after a disastrous June 27 debate against former President Trump, 78, in which the incumbent president struggled to finish his thoughts.
Biden’s internal party opposition gained steam last week, with 36 Democrats in Congress (more than one in eight caucus members) publicly calling on him to end his campaign.
Lawmakers said they feared it could cost them not only the White House but also the chance to control both chambers of Congress in the Nov. 5 elections, leaving Democrats without a meaningful hold on power.
This is in stark contrast to what happened last week in the Republican Party, when members rallied around Trump and his running mate, U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, 39.
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Harris, 59, would become the first black woman to run for president of a major party in the country’s history.
Trump told CNN on Sunday that he believed Harris would be easier to defeat.
Biden changed his mind at the last minute, a source familiar with the matter said. The president told allies Saturday night that he planned to stay in the race before changing his mind Sunday afternoon.
“The message last night was to go ahead with everything, full steam ahead,” the source told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. “About 1:45 p.m. today: the president told his senior team he had changed his mind.”
Biden announced his decision on social media within minutes.
It was unclear whether other prominent Democratic Party figures would challenge Harris for the party’s nomination (she was widely considered the preferred choice among many party leaders) or whether the party itself would choose to open the field to nominations.
Congressional Republicans have argued that Biden should resign from office immediately, which would hand the White House to Harris and put House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, in her place.
“If he can't run for president, how can he govern now? I mean, we're five months into this administration. It's a real concern, and it's a danger to the country,” Johnson told CNN on Sunday before Biden's announcement.
I GAVE MY ALL
Biden’s announcement follows a wave of public and private pressure from Democratic lawmakers and party officials to drop out of the race after his shockingly disappointing debate.
His troubles have diverted public attention from Trump’s performance, during which he made a series of false statements, to questions about Biden’s fitness for another four-year term.
Days later, she expressed renewed concerns in an interview, dismissing Democrats' concerns and the growing gap in opinion polls, and saying she would have had no problem losing to Trump if she knew he had “given it all.”
Her gaffes at the NATO summit, such as invoking Russian President Vladimir Putin when he meant Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and calling Harris “Vice President Trump,” have further stoked anxieties.
Just four days before Sunday’s announcement, Biden was diagnosed with COVID-19, forcing him to cut short a campaign trip to Las Vegas. More than one in 10 congressional Democrats had publicly called for him to drop out of the race.
Biden’s historic move — the first incumbent president to drop his party’s bid for re-election since President Lyndon Johnson during the Vietnam War in March 1968 — leaves his replacement with less than four months to campaign.
If Harris emerges as the nominee, the move would represent an unprecedented gamble for the Democratic Party: the first African-American and Asian-American woman to run for the White House in a country that has elected a black president and never a woman president in the past two centuries.
Biden was the oldest U.S. president ever elected when he defeated Trump in 2020. During that campaign, Biden portrayed himself as a bridge to the next generation of Democratic leaders. Some interpreted that to mean he would serve one term, a transitional figure who defeated Trump and returned his party to power.
But he had been aiming for a second term in the belief that he was the only Democrat who could beat Trump again, despite questions about Harris’s experience and popularity. Lately, though, his advanced age has begun to show more. His gait has become stilted and his childhood stutter has returned occasionally.
His team hoped that a strong showing in the June 27 debate would ease concerns about his age. It did the opposite: A Reuters/Ipsos poll after the debate showed that about 40 percent of Democrats thought he should drop out of the race.
Donors have begun to rebel, and Harris's supporters have begun to rally around her. Top Democrats, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a longtime ally, have told Biden he can't win the election.
Biden initially resisted pressure to step aside. He held damage-control calls and meetings with state lawmakers and governors, and sat for rare television interviews. But it wasn’t enough. Polls showed Trump’s lead widening in key swing states, and Democrats began to fear defeat in the House and Senate. On July 17, California Rep. Adam Schiff called on him to drop out of the race.
Biden’s exit creates a stark contrast between the Democratic nominee, Harris, a former prosecutor, and Trump, who is two decades older and faces two pending criminal cases related to his attempts to overturn the 2020 election. He is scheduled to be sentenced in New York in September for trying to hide a payment to a porn star.
BIDEN HAS DIFFICULTIES BEFORE DEBATE
Earlier this year, despite little opposition, Biden easily won the Democratic primary to choose a presidential candidate, despite voters' concerns about his age and health.
His staunch support for Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has eroded support among some in his own party, particularly young, progressive Democrats and voters of color, who form a key part of the Democratic base.
Many black voters say Biden hasn’t done enough for them, and enthusiasm among Democrats overall for a Biden second term has been low. Even before the debate with Trump, Biden was trailing the Republican in some national polls and in key states he would need to win to prevail on Nov. 5.
In recent months, Harris has been tasked with reaching out to those voters.
During the primary race, Biden amassed more than 3,600 delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August. That’s nearly double the 1,976 needed to win the party’s nomination.
Unless the Democratic Party changes the rules, delegates pledged to Biden will enter the convention “uncommitted,” leaving them the option to vote for his successor.
Democrats also have a system of “superdelegates,” top party officials and leaders elected without commitments, whose support is limited on the first ballot but who could play a decisive role in subsequent rounds.
Biden defeated Trump in 2020 by winning key battleground states, including tight Pennsylvania and Georgia. Nationally, he outperformed Trump by more than 7 million votes, winning 51.3 percent of the popular vote to Trump’s 46.8 percent.
