Senior Democrats across the country have said President Joe Biden should not run for re-election in 2024 as they have expressed concerns about his current leadership and his age.
Nearly all 50 Democratic officials interviewed by the Department of Defense The New York Times He fears that Biden’s re-election campaign will not help their party against the Republicans, who are expected to score sweeping victories in the upcoming midterm elections.
Democratic National Committee (DNC) Steve Simonides of Miami said he’s generally pessimistic about his party’s leadership and called on Biden, 79, to let someone new take over in 2024.
“To say our country is on the right track would be a stark departure from reality,” Simonides told The Times. He (Biden) must announce his intention not to seek re-election on the “24th immediately after the midterm elections.”
Shelia Huggins, another DNC member from Durham, North Carolina, has been more critical of the president.
“Democrats need bold new leadership for the 2024 presidential race,” she said. “This can’t be Biden.”
Nearly 50 Democratic officials interviewed by The New York Times said Joe Biden (pictured Friday) should not run for president
DNC members Steve Simonides (left) of Miami and Shelia Huggins (right) of North Carolina were downbeat about Biden’s leadership and called on young Democrats to take over.
Exacerbating the president’s problems are soaring gas prices, which have skyrocketed after Biden was elected president in November 2020.
One of the president’s biggest problems is soaring inflation, which hit 8.6 percent in May
Concerns about the health of GAFFE-prone Joe
Broken foot playing with dogs and pneumatic force on the plane
Biden was walking in a shoe after breaking his foot while playing with his dog, Major, in November 2020.
His doctor, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, said in a statement at the time that he would likely be asked to wear tall boots for several weeks.
However, Biden’s recovery appeared to be going well, and he was soon seen in public without the shoes on.
The president was then filmed falling three times as he boarded Air Force One in March 2021.
The president’s fall was blamed on “the breeze”, and he sustained no injuries.
He took Air Force One again last month.
High cholesterol and irregular pulse
In December 2019, there were concerns about Biden’s health, particularly ahead of the 2020 election.
He released medical records that showed he had an irregular heartbeat and high cholesterol, but described him as “healthy, active, 77-year-old”.
Some experts questioned whether or not he was as healthy as he claimed.
Tongue slices and fear of amnesia
Days before the election, he became flustered when he introduced his granddaughter Natalie at an event, instead referring to her as “My Son Bo”.
Beau Biden died in 2015 after suffering from a brain tumor.
He mistakenly referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as “boss” and incorrectly told US forces that they were going into Ukraine.
Last month, the president was photographed reaching out to shake no one’s hand during a speech in North Carolina as he strolled off the stage.
While several Democrats interviewed, many of whom asked not to be named, expressed gratitude for Biden’s victory over Donald Trump in 2020, they said the problems facing the president’s administration dealt a major blow to his party.
Among the big issues are record high inflation that’s the highest in more than 40 years, soaring gas prices — which hit $5 a gallon on Saturday, a prolonged pandemic, and the prospect of an end to federal abortion rights as they come in the Supreme Court. Gearing up to end Rowe in Wade in the coming weeks.
Also hurting were Biden’s failure to pass the $1.8 trillion Reconstruction Better agenda and expanded voting rights, which faced opposition from his own party, and the US military’s chaotic exit from Afghanistan last summer.
While David Axelrod, chief strategist for Barack Obama’s winning campaigns, has argued that Biden has done a good job given the unprecedented challenges he faced as a result of the pandemic, he fears that the president’s age may be a deciding factor on whether or not he can attract enough. Support the launch of a successful re-election bid.
“The presidency is a very stressful job and the stark reality is that the president will be closer to 90 than 80 at the end of a second term, and that will be a major issue,” Axelrod told The Times.
Biden became the oldest American to be inaugurated as president when he was sworn in at the age of 78 in 2021.
The campaign strategist said that while many would be able to tout Biden’s victories to brighten his image, the president lacks the ability to sensibly brag.
“He’s looking his age and he’s not as graceful in front of the camera as he used to be, and that’s fueled a narrative about competence that’s not rooted in reality.”
Biden’s frequent gaffes — where he stumbled down stairs, appeared to speak to no one and misrepresented world leaders — don’t help his image either.
The question remains about who will replace Biden in this deeply polarized political climate as Democrats fear Trump may launch his own campaign for 2024 re-election.
Few of those interviewed by the Times said they did not expect Vice President Kamala Harris to run.
Harris faced her failures in office, primarily through the crisis on the US-Mexico border despite her appointment as Border Czar.
Instead, several Democrats interviewed singled out US Senators Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker, as well as US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Texas gubernatorial candidate Beto O’Rourke.
Fayez Shakir, Bernie Sanders’ 2020 campaign manager, said it would be better for a young Democrat to run.
Shakir told the Times that while he believes Biden could defeat Trump in a 2024 rematch, the outcome could be different if Republicans instead nominate a rising star in their party, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeAntis.
“If it was DeSantis or someone else, I think it would be a different kind of challenge,” Mr. Shaker said.
Former DNC chair Howard Dean echoed the need for a fresh face and revealed that he’s running for the 40-year-old Buttigieg in the 2020 primary.
“The generation after me is just a complete rubbish pile,” Dean told The Times.
Former DNC chair Howard Dean said Democrats were desperate for younger candidates and called the generation that followed him “a complete trash heap.”
Biden’s approval ratings in his first 496 days in office were lower than Biden’s approval ratings during the same period as the Republican presidency.
President Joe Biden’s approval rating is less than 50 percent in every state except Hawaii
The Democrats’ unease comes as Biden’s approval ratings continue to decline as the percentage of the population who supports him has fallen below those who supported Trump, according to FiveThirtyEight.
Another tracker, Civiqs, shows Biden’s approval rating is below 50 percent in every US state except Hawaii, where Biden has 52 percent approval.
“Now he’s less than Trump, and he’s really crooked about it,” a person close to the administration told NBC News.
The president has the support of 40.7 percent of Americans as of Tuesday, while 41.6 percent of voters endorse Trump at this point in his term, according to the average of multiple polls conducted by FiveThirtyEight.
The number is now lower than that of its predecessors since the end of World War II. Trump’s rating has always been an exception to this criterion.
Biden’s disapproval rating on his 496th day in office, the most recent data, was also slightly higher than Trump’s.
An average of 54.1 percent of Americans disapprove of Biden now compared to 52.9 who disapprove of the Republican leader.
This comes because his approval rating of 40.7 is now lower than what Donald Trump was at this point in his tenure – by about 1%.
