President Joe Biden acknowledged in an interview that aired Sunday on CBS News that he had been pressured by Democrats to forgo reelection due to concerns about inferior candidates.
Biden announced his withdrawal from the 2024 presidential race via a letter posted on July 21, about three weeks after his poor performance in the debate with 2024 Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
In the three weeks leading up to Biden's announcement, numerous reports surfaced about private meetings held by leading Democrats – including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former President Barack Obama – to discuss the possibility of removing the president from office out of concern for the party's future.
Biden told CBS News chief elections and campaign correspondent Robert Costa that the polls showed him and Trump in a “close race.” The president maintained the race was “close all the way to the end,” but Trump made big gains in battleground states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, as well as Democratic strongholds New York and Virginia.
“The polls showed it was a close race. It was going to be close until the end,” Biden said.
“But a lot of my Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate thought that I would hurt them in their campaigns,” he continued, “and they were worried that if I continued on the campaign trail, that it would become a talking point. They thought that Nancy Pelosi would be interviewing me about why she said this or why she did that, and that would be a real distraction.”
NEW: President Joe Biden acknowledges that he was removed from the race by Democratic Party officials who staged an apparent coup.
“But many of my Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate thought I would hurt them in the election.”
This statement is consistent with… pic.twitter.com/jyifuqG4KC
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) August 11, 2024
California Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff and Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin Known allies of Pelosi had publicly called for Biden's resignation days before the president decided to step down. Despite these connections, Pelosi consistently maintained in an interview with CBS News' “60 Minutes” that she had “not called anyone” in connection to Biden's resignation. (Related article: President Joe Biden withdraws from 2024 presidential race, endorses Kamala Harris as successor
An anonymous Democrat was quoted as saying: Pack News The pressure campaign to force Biden to step down has been losing steam since the assassination attempt on Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. At least 50 Democrats reportedly spoke with Biden in a “tense” Zoom call that ended at 5pm on July 13 and were prepared to go public with their demands for the president to step down, shortly before Trump was shot in the ear at around 6pm.
Shortly after dropping out of the race for the 2024 Democratic nomination, Biden endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his successor. Trump is trailing Harris in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, according to a series of polls released Saturday by The New York Times and Siena College.
