NEW YORK — A sense of concern is growing within the upper echelons of the Democratic Party that leaders of Joe Biden’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee are not taking seriously enough the impact of the President’s worrying performance in the debate at the beginning of the week.
DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison and Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez held a call Saturday afternoon with dozens of committee members across the country, a group of some of the party’s most influential members. They largely ignored Biden’s poor performance on Thursday night or the avalanche of criticism that followed.
Several committee members present on the call, most granted anonymity to speak about the private discussion, described feeling like they were being shortchanged — that they were being asked to ignore the dire nature of the party’s predicament. The appeal, they said, may have worsened a widespread sense of panic among elected officials, donors and other stakeholders.
Instead, the people said, Harrison offered what they described as an optimistic assessment of Biden’s path forward. The chat function was disabled and no questions were allowed.
“I was hoping for a more substantive conversation rather than ‘Hey, let’s go out there and just be cheerleaders,’ without actually addressing a very serious issue that has played out on American television for millions of people to see,” said Joe Salazar, an elected member from the Colorado DNC, who was on the call. “There were a number of things that could have been said to address the situation, but we didn’t understand that.
Many donors, party strategists and rank-and-file DNC members are saying publicly and privately that they want the 81-year-old Biden to step aside to allow the party to select a younger replacement at the Democratic National Convention in August. For now, however, Biden’s closest allies insist he remains well positioned to compete against Republican Donald Trump and they have given no indication that they will pressure him to end his campaign.
Those best positioned to replace him — Vice President Kamala Harris, California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer among them — reiterated their support for Biden after the debate.
Many are eagerly awaiting the first major round of post-debate public polls to determine next steps.
CNN and 538/Ipsos polls conducted shortly after the debate revealed that most debate watchers thought Trump outperformed Biden. But the two men’s favorability ratings remained practically unchanged, as was the case in the consequences of Trump’s conviction on charges in New York that he illegally participated in a secret money scheme to influence the 2016 election.
In a subsequent appearance on MSNBC, Harrison downplayed the importance of the conference call, which he said was part of a regularly scheduled communication “to talk about the state of the race” and the upcoming national convention with the DNC’s many elected members across the country. .
Biden and his campaign have sought to project confidence in the days since Thursday’s debate, in which the president, who already faced serious concerns about his physical and mental stamina, delivered a performance punctuated by repeated stumbles, uncomfortable pauses and a style of speak calmly which was often difficult to understand.
Shortly after Saturday’s DNC conference call, the Biden campaign released a memo from senior adviser Jen O’Malley Dillon insisting that the debate had no tangible impact on the election.
“By every metric that matters, the data shows that this has done nothing to change the perception of the American people, our supporters are more enthusiastic than ever, and Donald Trump just reminded voters why they fired him four years ago and they failed to expand their appeal beyond their power. MAGA base,” O’Malley Dillon wrote.
She added: “If we see changes in the polls in the coming weeks, it will not be the first time that exaggerated media narratives have caused temporary dips in the polls.”
Meanwhile, Biden spent much of Saturday courting wealthy donors in New York’s famously wealthy enclave of the Hamptons.
“I didn’t have a great night, but neither did Trump,” Biden said of the debate at a gathering in East Hampton.
Of Trump, Biden said: “The big takeaway was his lies.”
Harrison reinforced the president’s message on the DNC call, which lasted about an hour. Hannah Muldavin, a spokeswoman for the DNC, said the discussion was a regularly scheduled quarterly conference call with committee members.
Topics included Biden’s energetic appearance in North Carolina the day after the debate and a fundraising surge that brought in more than $27 million for the campaign between debate day and Friday night, Muldavin said .
Harrison didn’t completely ignore the debate in her remarks, she said.
He briefly referenced Biden’s comments in his North Carolina speech that he doesn’t debate as well as he used to but knows how to get up when he’s knocked down.
Salazar noted that Harrison also suggested that party leaders always knew the 2024 presidential race would be close, a common Democratic talking point that angers Salazar.
“This shouldn’t be a close race,” Salazar said, pointing to Trump’s criminal record and long history of falsehoods. “They are the ones who should be looking for a new candidate, not us. And unfortunately for us, because of our president’s performance on Thursday night, this is now an open discussion.”
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Associated Press writers Will Weissert in Washington and Josh Boak in East Hampton, New York, contributed to this report.
