WASHINGTON – At 1:45 pm on Sunday, President Joe Biden’s senior team was notified that he was stepping away from the 2024 race. At 1:46 pm, this message was made public.
It was never Biden’s intention to abandon the race: until he decided to step aside on Sunday, he was committed.
His campaign was planning fundraisers and events and organizing travel in the coming weeks. But even as Biden publicly railed and insisted he would stay in the race, he was calmly reflecting on the debacle of recent weeks, the last three years of his presidency and the scope of his half-century career in politics. .
In the end, the decision was the president’s alone, and he made it quietly, from his vacation home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, sick with COVID-19, the first lady with him as he talked the matter over with a small circle of people who have been with him for decades.
“This has to be one of the hardest decisions he’s ever made,” said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., the president’s closest ally in Congress, who spoke with him on Sunday. “I know he wanted to fight and keep going and show that he could defeat Donald Trump again, but as he heard more and more input, I think he was struggling with what would be best for the country,” Coons said in an interview. with the Associated Press.
This story is based on interviews with more than a dozen people familiar with the president’s thinking in the final weeks, days and hours as he made his decision. They spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss private discussions.
It wasn’t until Saturday night that Biden began to come to the conclusion that he would not run for re-election. He began writing a letter to the American people.
Biden had been off the campaign trail for a few days, isolated because of COVID-19, when everything started to sink in – his chances growing ever greater of being able to defeat Donald Trump with much of his party in open rebellion, seeking to push him out of the race – not to mention voters’ lingering concerns about his age, which were only exacerbated by the catastrophic debate.
Biden was at his beach house with some of his and Jill Biden’s closest aides: chief strategist Mike Donilon, counselor to the president Steve Ricchetti, White House deputy chief of staff Annie Tomasini and Anthony Bernal, senior advisor to the first lady.
On Sunday, his decision crystallized. He spoke several times with Vice President Kamala Harris, whom he would support. He briefed White House chief of staff Jeff Zients and his longtime aide and campaign chairman Jen O’Malley Dillon.
A small group of senior campaign and White House advisers were gathered for the 1:45 p.m. conference call to convey Biden’s decision, while his campaign team released the announcement on social media a minute later.
“It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your president. And while it was my intention to seek re-election, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to resign and focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term,” Biden wrote. .
Almost half an hour later came his public vote of support for Harris. It was a carefully choreographed strategy, designed to give full weight to the president’s opening statement and put an end to the moment before moving on to the next step.
“Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be our party’s nominee this year,” Biden said in another post on X. “Democrats – it’s time to come together and defeat Trump.”
Elizabeth Alexander, Jill Biden’s communications director, said, “until the final hours of the decision only he could make, she supported whatever path he chose.
“She is your biggest believer, champion and is always there for you in that trusting way that only a wife of almost 50 years can be,” Alexander said.
It’s not like things were going well before the June 27 debate. In an August 2023 poll in Associated Press-NORC Public Affairs Research Center, 77% of US adults said Biden was too old to be effective for another four years. Not only did 89% of Republicans say this, but so did 69% of Democrats.
And the situation hadn’t improved by April, when more than half of American adults thought Biden’s presidency was hurting the country on issues like the cost of living and immigration.
But Biden insisted – to himself, to the nation, to his supporters – that he would be able to attract voters if he got out there, told people about his record, explained it to them. I spoke to them. He looked them in the eyes.
He had a lifetime of experience that told him that if he persisted, he would overcome. His campaign was so confident, in fact, that they organized a visit to the Commission on Presidential Debates to stage a series of showdowns with Trump under a new set of rules.
This produced the June 27th debate which triggered Biden’s downfall. Biden gave absurd answers, stopped mid-sentence and appeared to stare blankly at an audience of 51 million people. Perhaps most disturbing to other Democrats is the fact that Biden has not pursued Trump’s numerous falsehoods about his involvement in the violence surrounding the January 6, 2021, insurrection, abortion rights or immigration.
Biden and his team blamed the night on many different things. He had a cold. He was jet lagged. He needed more sleep. That night he opened the door for his group to expel him.
Publicly and privately, Biden was fighting to stay in the race. He was working to convince voters that he would be up to the task for four more years. He was frustrated that Democrats had publicly spoken out against him, but even more angered by leaks and anonymous sources who reported how even former President Barack Obama and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi were working to make him give up.
It seemed like he had won a few times; the chorus of naysayers seemed to subside. He had some well-received speeches mixed with subdued TV interviews and one day an extended press conference in which he demonstrated a nuanced understanding of politics but also made some gaffes that left him open-mouthed.
But the doubts did not disappear.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer ended up inviting Biden’s top officials to a meeting on July 11 to talk about their concerns. Did not went well. Senators expressed their concerns and almost none of them said they trusted the president. But even after that, Schumer was worried it wouldn’t affect Biden.
After the meeting, Schumer called House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former President Obama. Schumer decided that day to request a meeting with Biden.
At a July 13 meeting in Rehoboth, Schumer told Biden she was there out of love and care. And he made a personal appeal focused on Biden’s legacy, the future of the country and the impact that the top of the ticket could have on congressional races – and how that could potentially affect the Supreme Court. That same day, the assassination attempt on Donald Trump took place.
Schumer told the president she didn’t expect him to make an immediate decision, but hoped Biden would think about what he said, according to a person familiar with the conversation.
Biden responded, “I need another week,” and the two men hugged.
It was full steam ahead until Biden pulled the handbrake.
The president had lost his voice but was recovering well and his doctor sent an update to the public shortly before 1 p.m. about his condition. His small circle decided to post the statement on X on Sunday rather than let it leak for days before he was prepared to address the nation, which he is expected to do early this week.
Much of his campaign was caught by surprise and it was clear how little changed after he dropped out. Hours after the announcement, Biden’s campaign website reflected that he was still running and KamalaHarris.com was still redirecting to Biden’s page.
Even Harris’ statement announcing her intention to succeed Biden was sent by “Joe Biden for President”.
After the public announcement, Zients held a call with senior staff, sent an email and spoke with members of Biden’s Cabinet, emphasizing to them that nothing had changed when it came to governing and that the administration still had a lot to do. . work to do, according to two people with knowledge of the message. And the president also made personal calls.
“Team – I wanted to make sure you saw the attached letter from the president,” Zients wrote in the team email. “I couldn’t be prouder to work for President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and the American people – alongside all of you, the best White House team in history. There is so much more to do – and as President Biden says, ‘there is nothing America can’t do – when we do it together.’”
Vermont Sen. Peter Welch, a Democrat who has called for Biden to step down, was gardening with his wife when the news broke and said he was momentarily “stunned.” Senators exchanged text messages questioning whether this was really happening.
Connecticut Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal was at an event in his state and there was spontaneous applause when it was announced to the crowd that Biden would not run, he said.
There was a sense of enthusiasm and energy in the crowd “that was completely missing,” Blumenthal said.
“It was also, let’s be honest, a sense of relief,” he said. “And a sense of reverence for Joe Biden.”
By Sunday night, Biden for president had formally switched to Harris for president.
O’Malley Dillon told campaign staff that their jobs were safe because the operation was shifting to a campaign for Harris.
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Associated Press writer Farnoush Amiri contributed to this report.
This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
