Several of the Democratic Party’s top fundraisers are privately sounding the alarm after President Joe Biden’s disappointing performance in Thursday’s debate against former Republican President Donald Trump.
“Disaster,” said a Biden donor who plans to attend a fundraiser with the president Saturday in the Hamptons.
“It’s terrible. Worse than I thought possible. Everyone I talk to thinks Biden should quit,” said the person, who requested anonymity to recount private conversations.
CNBC began hearing concerns from Democratic campaign donors and fundraisers less than 20 minutes into the 90-minute debate hosted by CNN.
“It’s over,” said a longtime Democratic campaign adviser who has been fundraising for congressional leaders for more than a decade and helped raise money for Biden’s 2020 White House bid.
“Biden has to go. He has to go now and if he doesn’t go, we’re going to get crushed,” the adviser said. They told CNBC they plan to approach Democratic National Committee Chairman Jaime Harrison on Friday to discuss what happened at the debate.
An adviser to one of the Democratic Party’s top donors called the debate “an absolute disaster” for Biden. “Worse than (Ronald) Reagan in 1984 or (George W.) Bush in 2004 or (Barack) Obama in 2012,” they added.
Biden’s problems in the debate started early. He stumbled out of the door, seemed to lose his train of thought at times, and paused for a long moment before CNN moderators cut him off as he discussed health care in the United States.
“We have to make sure that we are able to make every single person eligible for what I was able to do with Covid, excuse me, with everything that we have to do with it, look…,” Biden said , his voice interrupted.
“Listen, if we finally beat Medicare,” Biden said, before CNN anchor and moderator Jack Tapper smoothly moved on. “Thank you, President Biden,” Tapper said.
Several times later during the debate, the president repeated himself, or left several seconds of silence mid-response. Throughout the evening, Biden’s voice was raspy and quiet.
Biden campaign co-chair Mitch Landrieu told NBC News that it was because the president had a cold. “I think because of the way people analyze debates, it’s going to be about physical performance first,” Landrieu said.
Vice President Kamala Harris herself acknowledged that Biden was not in the best shape. “Yes, it was a slow start, but it was a strong finish,” she said on CNN Thursday night.
For example, in responding to a question about border security — a major issue for voters this election cycle — Biden’s sentence was grammatically difficult to follow.
“I’m going to keep moving forward until we get the total ban on the total initiative versus what we’re going to do with more border patrol and more asylum agents,” Biden said.
Trump took advantage of these missteps. “I don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either,” the former president joked.
Representatives for the Biden campaign did not respond to requests for comment.
Replacing Biden on the candidate list would be extremely difficult now, with less than two months until the Democratic National Convention in August. The president should effectively withdraw from the race, leaving the decision about the candidate to the delegates present at the convention.
“It was a really disappointing debate performance by Joe Biden, I don’t think there’s any other way to settle it,” said Kate Bedingfield, former White House communications director in the Biden administration until 2023, on CNN.
“His biggest problem was proving to the American people that he had the energy, the stamina – and he didn’t do it,” she said.
News Source : www.cnbc.com
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