WASHINGTON — Lawmakers are increasingly calling for President Joe Biden to step down as his party’s nominee, with nearly a dozen Democrats joining them on Friday, bringing the total number of House Democrats who want to install someone else at the top of the nomination list to more than 30.
The new defectors include two aides to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and a third senator.
Sen. Martin Heinrich, who is up for re-election in New Mexico this fall, is the third Senate Democrat to call on Biden to drop out of the race, joining Sens. Peter Welch of Vermont and Jon Tester, who is facing a tough re-election election in Montana.
Biden’s latest defections in the House come from within some of the president’s base. Democratic Rep. Mark Veasey of Texas was the first of several Congressional Black Caucus leaders who campaigned with Biden in Nevada this week to call on him to step down.
Rep. Vesey and three other Democratic House members, Rep. Jared Huffman of California, Rep. Chuy Garcia of Illinois and Rep. Mark Pocan of Wisconsin, praised Biden’s decades of public service but said in a joint statement that now is the time for the 81-year-old president to “pass the baton” to give Democrats the best chance to defeat Republican nominee Donald Trump in November’s presidential election.
Garcia is a member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, whose chairwoman, Rep. Nanette Barragan of California, campaigned with Biden in Nevada this week and whose super PAC endorsed Biden on Friday. Other members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus who have previously called for Biden to resign include Rep. Raul Grijalva of Arizona and Rep. Mike Levin of California.
Pocan, meanwhile, is chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, the precursor to the former LGBTQ+ Caucus, and a former co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, whose most prominent members, including New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, have urged Democrats not to abandon Biden.
Huffman is also a close ally of Speaker Emeritus Nancy Pelosi, a progressive who represents her neighboring San Francisco Bay Area district.
Another close Bay Area ally of Pelosi’s, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., joined the group of critics on Friday, releasing a letter she sent to Biden on Thursday night. In it, Lofgren cited her work before the House Jan. 6 committee and warned that Trump “remains the same grave threat to constitutional order and the rule of law as he was when he incited the insurrection on January 6, 2021.”
“We must face the reality that widespread public concerns about your age and health are jeopardizing a campaign we must win,” Veazey, Garcia, Pocan and Huffman said in a joint statement about Biden. “While this perception may not be fair, it was solidified in the aftermath of last month’s debate and is now unlikely to change.”
“We believe the most responsible and patriotic thing you can do at this moment is to step down as candidate and continue to lead your party from the White House. The Democratic Party has a deep and talented group of young leaders, starting with Vice President Kamala Harris, and you have lifted them up, empowered them, and prepared them for this moment,” they continued. “Passing the baton would fundamentally change the trajectory of this campaign, energize the race, and provide enthusiasm and momentum for the Democratic Party heading into next month’s convention.”
Meanwhile, Rep. Sean Kasten, R-Illinois, called on Biden to back down in an op-ed he wrote in the Chicago Tribune on Friday. “As long as this election is fought over which candidate is more likely to be held accountable for public gaffes and ‘senior citizen moments,’ I believe Biden will not only lose, but will also be completely unable to change that debate,” Kasten wrote.
And Rep. Greg Landsman, D-Ohio, one of the Republicans’ top targets for 2024, said in a lengthy thread on X that there is “too much at stake” for Biden to continue as the Democratic nominee in 2024.
On Friday afternoon, veteran Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.) urged Biden to back down, after she quickly endorsed Harris as his replacement and former congressman and Minnesota governor Tim Walz as Biden’s running mate.
Following McCollum’s lead are Rep. Kathy Kastle, D-Fla., a former chair of the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, and Rep. Morgan McGarvey, D-Ky., a freshman lawmaker.
The new defections mean more than 10% of Democrats in the House and Senate, or 33 of 264, now want Biden to withdraw from the election. The 11 who issued statements on Friday marked the highest single-day number of Democratic defections since the June 27 debate debacle.
But Biden has repeatedly said he’s not going anywhere and credited 14 million Democratic primary voters with winning the nomination.
Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon appeared on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Friday and acknowledged that it’s been a “tough few weeks” for Biden since his disastrous debate performance and that his “support has dwindled a bit.” But she insisted that Biden still has a path to defeat Trump and will begin campaigning as soon as next week once he recovers from COVID-19.
“You’ve heard it directly from the president many times. He’s in this race to win, he’s our nominee and he’s going to be our president for a second term,” she said.
