Several of President Biden’s 2020 presidential rivals have called on him to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race.
As Biden’s advisers scramble to contain the fallout from last week’s debate with former President Trump, Democrats are considering whether the embattled incumbent should continue in the race with just months to go until Election Day.
“He should step down for the good of the country,” Andrew Yang, a tech entrepreneur who sought the Democratic nomination four years ago, told The Hill on Tuesday.
Yang joins a growing list of former candidates across the party’s ideological spectrum who believe Biden is unfit to remain in the presidential race.
“I don’t see a path forward for President Biden,” Julián Castro, a former secretary of Housing and Urban Development who served in the Obama-Biden administration, told MSNBC. “Another Democrat would have a better chance of beating President Trump,” he said.
The list of opponents also includes former Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan and current presidential candidate Marianne Williamson, but is currently limited to non-incumbent Democrats.
Within the administration, attention is now focused on Vice President Harris and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who have been discussed as possible replacements for Biden if another Democrat were to take on Trump.
Ryan, who hails from a heavily Republican battleground state, wrote to X, “The Band-Aid must be ripped off! The stakes are too high,” and endorsed Harris as his successor.
“@VP“She has grown into the job and will beat Trump in the debates, highlight choice, energize the base, win back young voters and bring about a generational change. The time is now!” he wrote.
But in Congress, one of Biden’s most prominent former opponents, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), told The Associated Press that Biden should stick with the status quo.
“Before the debate, I didn’t think he could win,” the Vermont senator told The Associated Press. “What the American people need is maturity, an understanding that the issues are what matter.”
The calls from Biden’s former opponents come after Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas, the first Democrat in the House of Representatives, urged Biden to drop out.
