1. Vice President Harris
2. Gretchen Whitmer
3. Pete Buttigieg
4. Josh Shapiro
5. Jared Polis
6. Gavin Newsom
7. Raphael G. Warnock
8. Michelle Obama
9. Amy Klobuchar
10. Andy Beshear
President Biden has
repeatedly and rightfully described the stakes in this November’s presidential
election as nothing less than the future of American democracy.
Donald Trump has proved
himself to be a significant jeopardy to that democracy — an erratic and
self-interested figure unworthy of the public trust. He systematically
attempted to undermine the integrity of elections. His supporters have
described, publicly, a 2025 agenda that would give him the power to carry out
the most extreme of his promises and threats. If he is returned to office, he
has vowed to be a different kind of president, unrestrained by the checks on
power built into the American political system.
Mr. Biden has said that he is
the candidate with the best chance of taking on this threat of tyranny and
defeating it. His argument rests largely on the fact that he beat Mr. Trump in
2020. That is no longer a sufficient rationale for why Mr. Biden should be the
Democratic nominee this year.
At Thursday’s debate, the
president needed to convince the American public that he was equal to the
formidable demands of the office he is seeking to hold for another term.
Voters, however, cannot be expected to ignore what was instead plain to see:
Mr. Biden is not the man he was four years ago.
The
president
appeared on Thursday night as the shadow of a
great public servant. He struggled to explain what he would accomplish in a
second term. He struggled to respond to Mr. Trump’s provocations. He struggled
to hold Mr. Trump accountable for his lies, his failures and his chilling plans.
More than once, he struggled to make it to the end of a sentence.
Mr.
Biden has been an admirable president. Under his leadership, the nation has prospered and begun to address a
range of long-term challenges, and the wounds ripped open by Mr. Trump have
begun to heal. But the greatest public service Mr. Biden can now perform is to
announce that he will not continue to run for re-election.
As it stands, the president is engaged in a reckless
gamble. There are Democratic leaders better equipped to present clear,
compelling and energetic alternatives to a second Trump presidency. There is no
reason for the party to risk the stability and security of the country by
forcing voters to choose between Mr. Trump’s deficiencies and those of Mr.
Biden. It’s too big a bet to simply hope Americans will overlook or discount
Mr. Biden’s age and infirmity that they see with their own eyes.
If the race comes down to a choice between Mr. Trump
and Mr. Biden, the sitting president would be this board’s unequivocal pick.
That is how much of a danger Mr. Trump poses. But given that very danger, the
stakes for the country and the uneven abilities of Mr. Biden, the United States
needs a stronger opponent to the presumptive Republican nominee. To make a call
for a new Democratic nominee this late in a campaign is a decision not taken
lightly, but it reflects the scale and seriousness of Mr. Trump’s challenge to
the values and institutions of this country and the inadequacy of Mr. Biden to
confront him.
Ending his candidacy would be against all of Mr.
Biden’s personal and political instincts. He has picked himself up from
tragedies and setbacks in the past and clearly believes he can do so again.
Supporters of the president are already explaining away Thursday’s debate as
one data point compared with three years of accomplishments. But the
president’s performance cannot be written off as a bad night or blamed on a
supposed cold, because it affirmed concerns that have been mounting for months
or even years. Even when Mr. Biden tried to lay out his policy proposals, he
stumbled. It cannot be outweighed by other public appearances because he has
limited and carefully controlled his public appearances.
It should be remembered that
Mr. Biden challenged Mr. Trump to this verbal duel. He set the rules, and he
insisted on a date months earlier than any previous general election debate. He
understood that he needed to address longstanding public concerns about his
mental acuity and that he needed to do so as soon as possible.
The truth Mr. Biden needs to
confront now is that he failed his own test.
In polls and interviews,
voters say they are seeking fresh voices to take on Mr. Trump. And the
consolation for Mr. Biden and his supporters is that there is still time to
rally behind a different candidate. While Americans are conditioned to the long
slog of multiyear presidential elections, in many democracies, campaigns are
staged in the space of a few months.
It is a tragedy that
Republicans themselves are not engaged in deeper soul-searching after
Thursday’s debate. Mr. Trump’s own performance ought to be regarded as
disqualifying. He lied brazenly and repeatedly about his own
actions, his record as president and his opponent. He described plans that
would harm the American economy, undermine civil liberties and fray America’s
relationships with other nations. He refused to promise that he would accept defeat,
returning instead to the kind of rhetoric that incited the Jan. 6 attack on
Congress.
The Republican Party,
however, has been co-opted by Mr. Trump’s ambitions. The burden rests on
the Democratic Party to put the interests of the nation above the ambitions of
a single man.
Democrats who have deferred
to Mr. Biden must now find the courage to speak plain truths to the party’s
leader. The confidants and aides who have encouraged the president’s candidacy
and who sheltered him from unscripted appearances in public should recognize
the damage to Mr. Biden’s standing and the unlikelihood that he can repair it.
Mr.
Biden answered an urgent question on Thursday night. It was not the answer that
he and his supporters were hoping for. But if the risk of a second Trump term
is as great as he says it is — and we agree with him that the danger is
enormous — then his dedication to this country leaves him and his party only
one choice.
The clearest path for
Democrats to defeat a candidate defined by his lies is to deal truthfully with
the American public: acknowledge that Mr. Biden can’t continue his race, and
create a process to select someone more capable to stand in his place to defeat
Mr. Trump in November.
It is the best chance to
protect the soul of the nation — the cause that drew Mr. Biden to run for the
presidency in 2019 — from the malign warping of Mr. Trump. And it is the best
service that Mr. Biden can provide to a country that he has nobly served for so
long.
- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
