Biden drops out of race, endorses vice president Kamala Harris

By Peter Baker / © 2024 The New York Times Company

President Joe Biden on Sunday abruptly abandoned his campaign for a second term under intense pressure from fellow Democrats and threw his support to Vice President Kamala Harris to lead their party in a dramatic last-minute bid to stop former President Donald Trump from returning to the White House.

“It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your President,” he said in a letter posted on social media. “And while it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term.”

Biden then posted a subsequent online message endorsing Harris. “My very first decision as the party nominee in 2020 was to pick Kamala Harris as my Vice President,” he wrote. “And it’s been the best decision I’ve made. Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year. Democrats — it’s time to come together and beat Trump. Let’s do this.”

The president’s decision upended the race and set the stage for a raucous and unpredictable campaign unlike any in modern times, leaving Harris just more than 100 days to consolidate support from Democrats, establish herself as a credible national leader and prosecute the case against Trump.

Although Democratic convention delegates must ratify the choice of Harris to take over as standard-bearer next month, Biden’s endorsement meant the nomination was hers to lose and she appeared in a powerful position to claim it. While Biden, 81, remained president and still planned to finish out his term in January, the transition of the campaign to Harris, 59, amounted to a momentous generational change of leadership of the Democratic Party.

The president said he would “speak to the nation later this week in more detail about my decision.” One person informed about the matter said Biden had told his senior staff at 1:45 p.m. that he had changed his mind, an announcement that surprised many aides who had been told as recently as Saturday night that his campaign was still full speed ahead. It was not immediately clear whether he wrote the letter himself or had help, nor did his aides know when or how he might address the nation.

The president’s decision meant that a nomination will be settled at a convention rather than through primaries. Harris starts the truncated process in the strongest position. Within minutes of Biden’s announcement, one potential rival, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, announced she would not run. Another, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, had previously said he would not challenge Harris.

Biden announced his withdrawal after a disastrous debate performance against Trump cemented public concerns about his age and touched off widespread panic among Democrats about his ability to prevent the former president from reclaiming power. Democratic congressional leaders petrified by dismal poll numbers pressed Biden to gracefully exit, angry donors threatened to withhold their money and down-ballot candidates feared he would take down the whole ticket.

No sitting president has dropped out of a race so late in the election cycle in U.S. history, and Harris and any other contenders for the nomination will have just weeks to earn the backing of the nearly 4,000 delegates to the Democratic National Convention. While the convention is scheduled to take place in Chicago from Aug. 19 to Aug. 22, the party had already planned to conduct a virtual roll call vote before Aug. 7 to ensure access to ballots in all 50 states, leaving little time to assemble support.

Biden’s campaign for a second term collapsed in swift and stunning fashion after leading Democrats concluded that he would be unable to defeat Trump in the fall. During their nationally televised debate last month, Biden, the oldest president in U.S. history, appeared frail, hesitant, confused and diminished, losing a critical opportunity to make his case against Trump, a felon who tried to overturn the last election.

Although Trump, 78, is just a few years younger than Biden, he came across as forceful at the debate even as he made repeated false and misleading statements. Questions have been raised about Trump’s own cognitive decline. He often rambles incoherently in interviews and at campaign rallies and has confused names, dates and facts just as Biden has. But Republicans have not turned against him as Democrats did against Biden.

The president’s age was a primary concern of voters long before the debate. Even most Democrats told pollsters more than a year ago that they thought he was too old for the job. Born during World War II and first elected to the Senate in 1972 before two-thirds of today’s Americans were even born, Biden would have been 86 at the end of a second term.

Biden consistently maintained that his experience was an advantage, enabling him to pass landmark legislation and manage foreign policy crises. He maintained that he was the Democrat best equipped to defeat Trump given that he did so in 2020.

But his efforts to reassure Democrats that he was up to the task following the damaging debate failed to shore up support. Instead, his slowness to reach out to party leaders and some of the answers he gave in interviews only fueled internal discontent.

In bowing out, Biden became the first incumbent president in 56 years to give up a chance to run again. With six months remaining in his term, his decision instantly transformed him into a lame duck. But he can be expected to use his remaining time in office to try to consolidate gains on domestic policy and manage ongoing wars in Europe and the Middle East.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.