The final blow was delivered in the scorching summer heat of the nation’s capital by a president in crisis and the leaders of his own party. The reasons Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential race are eerily similar to the situation faced by Richard Nixon exactly 50 years ago. Both men believed they could survive fatal injuries, but instead of letting the voters decide their fate, both were ultimately destroyed by their own parties.
With Biden’s abrupt withdrawal from the presidential race still fresh in our memory, this week marks 50 years since Nixon’s resignation on Aug. 8, 1974. There have been few moments like this in Washington since Nixon’s downfall. Bill Clinton’s 1998 impeachment trial was not at risk of removing him from office, and the whole affair was more of a dark drama than a constitutional crisis. There were no Democratic senators visiting Clinton to tell him his term was over, and no media attacks on him. All at once.
Joe Biden’s downfall was swifter and in some ways more brutal than that of Richard Nixon. It wasn’t the legislative process, it was pure politics.
This summer was a repeat of 1974, not 1998. Both Nixon and Biden tried to defy public opinion and hold on to the nation’s highest office, but they were battling a hurricane that was steadily loosening their grip on power. Both were in the White House covering up presidential failures — one legal, the other physical and mental. Both repeatedly said they would not resign.
Biden did not face constitutional impeachment proceedings, but he faced the same pressure to forego reelection that was applied to Nixon: media leaks, members of Congress telling the president publicly and privately that his term was over, and a sudden spotlight on whether the vice president was ready to serve, repeated half a century later.
After aggressively stating that he would run the election to the end, Biden lost the support of the Democratic Party elite and almost all of the media, and his reputation shifted from that of a savior of the republic to that of a delusional, bitter old man who was incompetent but ignoring reality.
Never before has a sitting president been forced to abandon a reelection campaign when his chances had already been secured in the primaries. Lyndon Baines Johnson’s shocking decision not to seek reelection in 1968 caused as much upheaval as Biden’s decision with less than a month until the Democratic National Convention. Ironically, the convention was to be held in the same city as in 1968, Chicago, a notorious site for unrest and street fighting between activists and the Chicago Police Department.
The question of Biden’s fitness to not only run again but to serve the remainder of his term echoes questions asked during the final days of President Nixon, with reports emerging that Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger had declared that any executive order to use nuclear weapons must be approved by him. Reports that Nixon was drinking, praying, and nearing a mental breakdown reflect concerns that Biden is now unable to perform his duties coherently. Indeed, Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana), have called on Biden to resign or face removal under the 25th Amendment, which would have to be led by his chosen successor, Kamala Harris.
So what was the final factor that forced these presidents out of office?
For Nixon, it wasn’t even when the House Judiciary Committee passed three articles of impeachment on July 30, after which he still believed he would survive.
Nixon had apparently decided to resign by early August, but the point of no return came when Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.) and two other senior Republican officials told him they were resigning after the release of the so-called “smoking gun” tape on August 5. It was a recording of an Oval Office discussion between Nixon and his Chief of Staff, H.R. Haldeman, in June 1972, less than a week after the Watergate break-in and the arrest of burglars connected to Nixon’s reelection campaign. On the tape, Nixon can be heard approving a cover-up and the use of the CIA to thwart an FBI investigation.
But by the time Goldwater visited the White House, Nixon had been bleeding for over a year. The Senate held televised hearings between May and November 1973 that became “must-see” television in Washington and much of the country, followed by impeachment hearings by the House of Representatives in the last week of July 1974.
Joe Biden’s downfall was swift and, in some ways, more brutal. It wasn’t the legislative process, it was pure politics.
Biden was viewed as a competent commander in chief until his disastrous June 27 debate defeat against Donald Trump, but his dismal performance quickly erased the support of the public, Congress and the media (Nixon had little media support), and his repeated angry declarations that he would continue until the general election came to be seen increasingly as futile and out of touch with political reality.
Like Nixon, Biden watched as politicians mocked his case and steadily undermined his claim to remain in the race. And like Nixon, he had to contend with leaks from his own party that made his future uncertain. In both cases, stakeholders were driven first by anxiety about their own political fates and then by anxiety about the fate of the nation.
In the end, as with Nixon, it was party pressure that forced Biden to resign. Nearly 20 people, including Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer, had openly or indirectly said Biden should resign, but Biden’s own party’s abandonment of him was the key to his decision. Finish offPerhaps reports of Obama’s ultimatum to Biden echo Goldwater’s pressure on Nixon. It was only when Biden caved in to threats of impeachment from his vice president and cabinet, humiliated and isolated, that his own party suddenly began calling him a national hero.
And just like in 1974, all eyes are now on the vice president.
At the time, few in Washington doubted that Gerald Ford was the man to go to if he was going to leave the country. Though he was the only man to have been elected president or vice president and to have served as chief executive officer, Ford was a veteran and widely respected member of Congress.
Kamala Harris is a different story. The Democratic Party quickly coalesced around her, but few have forgotten how her political fortunes have been shaken, from dropping out of the 2020 Democratic primary before a single vote was cast, to exiling her staff, to internal criticism of her lack of preparation and disinterest in policy, to widespread ridicule for her poor public speaking.
The summers of 1974 and 2024 were political theater of the highest order. 1974 had at least something of a civics lesson; 2024 was pure flesh-and-blood politics. They also reminded us that in the age of digital and cable news, political parties remain unchallenged and the most powerful component of our political system. If Donald Trump bounced back after being abandoned in 2020 because he controlled his party, Richard Nixon and Joe Biden fell because their parties abandoned them.
Editor’s note:This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and published via RealClearWire.
