What will we learn from a president? A brief update on Mr. Schumer’s twitchy defeat of his re-election campaign
We know Mr. Schumer is feeling a bit twitchy about the situation. According to a Wednesday evening report by Axios, he is signaling to donors that he is open to the idea of an alternative nominee. And while allies of Mr. Schumer say he would never tell Mr. Biden flat out that he had to quit the race, given his respect for both the president and the enormity of such a decision, the voice of the Senate majority leader would carry disproportionate weight if he wanted to shape the president’s thinking. Mr. Schumer speaks not just for himself, but for the chamber’s Democratic caucus, to which Mr. Biden proudly belonged for so many years. The House is a place where the president may want to thumb his nose at Democrats. But his former Senate colleagues? They are harder to dismiss. A few of Mr. Biden’s senior advisers are going to the DSU headquarters on Thursday for a caucus lunch.
No one likes to be the bearer of bad news. And when the news is as bad as telling the president of the United States that he should rethink his re-election campaign, because the bulk of voters think he is too old for the job, vanishingly few people have the stature or spine for such a heart-to-heart.
Most of them stopped short of asking him to step aside. Jon Tester repeated the line shared by most Democrats, that the decision is not theirs to make.
Democrats are watching a solo press conference that will be held after the NATO summit. It will be a chance for Biden to prove that he can handle the campaign road ahead, and it will also be a chance for him to demonstrate his ability on a national stage.
President Biden’s top campaign staff attempted to salvage support from Democratic Senators Thursday in a nearly two-hour meeting that did not appear to immediately resolve their fears.
After the meeting, Richard Blumenthal stated that he needs to see more from Biden’s campaign and more from Biden himself.
“Some of my concerns are allayed, some other have been deepened,” Blumenthal said. I need more of the kind of analytic tricks that show the path to success.
Democratic Sen. Bennet, M.J. Merkley, and J. O’Malley Dillon and Julie Chavez Rodriguez: The Race to Preserve the Blue Wall
The meeting was scheduled a day earlier because support for Biden appeared to be getting worse among Democrats in Congress.
In a memo obtained by NPR, Jen O’Malley Dillon and Julie Chavez Rodriguez told staff on Thursday that there’s a path to win the election, despite the “setback” of the debate, focusing on the “Blue Wall” states of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan.
There is a belief that there has been increased anxiety following the debate, but we don’t see that translate into a drastic shift in vote share in key states, according to the memo.
That poll also shows a majority of Democratic voters wanted Biden to step aside. They said there is no sign in the polls that alternate Democratic nominees would do any better than Biden.
They said the campaign needs to stay focused on contrasting Biden’s achievements with Trump’s record on reproductive rights and on the Project 2025 agenda. The best way to help Donald Trump is to spend his convention talking about why we should all vote for him, not about what he’s going to do in Milwaukee, they said.
The vast majority of senators wanted to avoid questions from the reporters. However Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., reiterated her support for Biden.
But a growing number of Democrats — publicly and privately — have raised concerns about Biden in recent days. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo, publicly confirmed that he told members this week that he is worried Biden will lose the election “by a landslide” and “take the House and Senate” with him.
“I think President Biden should look at all of the information and carry on detailed conversations with key leaders, including Leader Schumer and Leader Jeffries, and should do what’s best for the nation,” Merkley told NPR in an interview.
Vermont Sen. Peter Welch wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post sayin that Democrats “cannot unsee President Biden’s disastrous debate performance” and urging Biden to back down.