President Joe Biden could make a decision within days whether to remain a candidate for re-election, said the governor of Hawaii, who attended a recent meeting with Biden and others Democratic governors and whose family has known the president for years.
And if Biden decides not to run, Hawaii Gov. Josh Verde told the Associated Press on Saturday that he believes the president will designate the vice president Kamala Harris to replace it on the ticket.
“I think the president stays in this race unless he feels it’s unwinnable, or he feels he needs to listen to other voices in his inner circle who shouldn’t be running,” Green said. “If the president felt he didn’t measure up and he really didn’t measure up, he would resign.
“We’ll probably know in the next few days how the president feels about all of this,” he said.
Biden has repeatedly insisted that he will remain in the race against his likely Republican opponent, former President donald trump. But questions about Biden’s mental acuity have grown since her disastrous debate performance last month. While some of his Democratic colleagues encouraged Biden to abandon the campaign, the president pointed to support from other elected officials in the party, especially governors.
Green, who was a doctor on the Big Island of Hawaii before being elected governor, said everyone has parents or grandparents who go through times that aren’t so great or pauses in their ability to express themselves clearly. But, he added, they are not dismissed because of their experience, wisdom and role in the family.
“That’s why I stand by the president until he tells me otherwise,” Green said.
Green said the deadline of a few days for a decision anticipates the pressure that could be placed on Biden after members of Congress return this week to the Capitol.
“I really, honestly think he has to make the decision. And it shouldn’t come from another governor. It shouldn’t come from anyone but his closest advisors and his own heart,” Green said.
Green was quick to point out that Trump is only three years younger than Biden and that both will have bad days in the future. But he argued that temperament is more important than age.
“For God’s sake, these two guys have to have the nuclear codes,” Green said. “I don’t want someone who tweets in the middle of the night and gets angry at other countries. I have with President Biden.
If Biden were to abandon the campaign, Green said the president should be allowed to say who he thinks should replace him on the ticket.
“I think it’s very clear that the Democratic Party would be generally ecstatic if the president appointed his vice president if necessary,” Green said.
Harris “is a powerful person, she’s also a female thought leader, she’s an African American who was (California’s) attorney general,” Green said. “There are no better credentials than those of the current vice president.”
Green, whose wife’s uncle was Biden’s college roommate, also provided insight into last week’s meeting the governors had with the president. During the meeting, Green asked Biden about his health. Biden responded by saying everything was fine except his brain.
Green told the AP that the president was joking and that the context was lost when leaked by others.
“It was absolutely a joke, and to make a self-deprecating joke you have to have intact cognitive function, period,” Green said.
He also dismissed any claim that advisers planned the meeting so that Biden-supporting governors would speak first to stifle any dissent. Instead, he said it was a very frank and impromptu conversation with 25 governors with differing opinions.
“That call was just like you would expect in a coffee shop, some people complained, some people, you know, probably overly praised the president, but almost everyone was just trying to see, ‘Are we OK?’” Green said.
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Thiessen reported from Anchorage, Alaska.
