Former President Barack Obama told his allies in recent days that he believes President Biden needs to reconsider his candidacy, The Washington Post reported Thursday, citing multiple people briefed on his thinking.
A source familiar with Obama’s thinking, asked about the new Washington Post report, tells Fox News that the former president “continues to see his primary role as a sounding board and counselor for President Biden, as they have long done for each other for many years now. He believes Joe Biden has been an outstanding President and is protective of him both personally and of the Biden administration’s strong and historic accomplishments.”
Obama reportedly has only spoken with Biden once since his disastrous debate performance last month. According to the Post, Obama has expressed serious concern to his allies, however, about the viability of Biden's candidacy and remains focused on preserving Biden's legacy.
In his discussions with others, Obama reportedly has emphasized that Biden alone can make the decision to step away from the race. Obama has also pushed back against the idea that he alone can influence Biden, his former vice president, to withdraw from his presidential re-election bid.
Fox News' Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.
A well-connected advisor and fundraising coordinator for President Biden's campaign is reportedly warning that donations are at risk of drying up, according to reports.
Film producer and Democratic insider Jeffrey Katzenberg reportedly spoke with Biden in a private meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Wednesday.
During the meeting, Katzenberg allegedly told the president that major donors were likely to cut funding due to concerns about the campaign's viability, according to a report from Semafor.
Following the report, Katzenberg released a statement saying the characterization was inaccurate and that the two had "talked about everything from the convention to new ads.""And by the way, we will raise the money we need to run a winning campaign," he added.
This is an excerpt from an article by Fox News Digital's Timothy Nerozzi.
President Biden's allies reportedly retaliated against Rep. Hillary Scholten, a first term Democrat from Michigan, after she called for him to step away from his re-election bid.
Scholten, who flipped a traditionally red seat in 2022, was removed from a coordinated effort between the Biden campaign and the state Democratic party to elect candidates up and down the ticket last week, Politico reported, citing four people with knowledge of the situation.
The congresswoman was kicked out shortly after she called for Biden to drop out. The decision to exclude Scholten came from the state Democratic party, two sources told Politico.
Politico reached out to the Biden campaign on Wednesday for comment.
Scholten was reportedly welcomed back to the combined field effort involves the presidential, Senate and House races on Thursday morning.
If she was kept off, Democratic organizers campaigning in her district would have mentioned Biden and the party's Senate nominee, but not Scholten, Politico reported.
“Rep. Scholten is welcome at the coordinated campaign and we look forward to campaigning with her this fall,” Mia Ehrenberg, a spokesperson for the Biden campaign, told Politico.
{{#rendered}}MSNBC's Joe Scarborough blasted President Biden's inner circle on Thursday, urging those close to the 81-year-old president to "step up" and help him "do the right thing."
Biden is facing growing calls from Democrats to drop out of the race.
“This is not going to end well if it continues to drag out,” Scarborough said on his “Morning Joe” talk show. "It’s really incumbent on people that are around Joe Biden to step up at this point and help the president and help the man they love and do the right thing."
“The anger I hear are at the people that are keeping him in a bubble or who may have their own interests, some financial, in keeping him in the race. That is the real anger,” Scarborough continued. "It is widespread. Joe Biden deserves better. He deserves better than he is getting from those closest to him.”
Scarborough noted his wife and co-host Mika Brzezinksi’s relationship with the Biden family.
“We have known him for a long time,” Scarborough said. “Mika and her family, extraordinarily close to the Bidens.”
The left-leaning program "Morning Joe" was reportedly pulled from the air on Monday following the assassination attempt on former President Trump.
Several top Democrats told Axios on Thursday they now believe President Biden will discontinue his re-election campaign. The decision reportedly could come as soon as this weekend.
Though Biden has publicly insisted he would not drop out, the Democratic lawmakers told Axios they believe the president has privately conceded to poll numbers and growing pressure from party congressional leaders, close friends and key donors insisting that he can’t win in November.
Biden is self-isolating in Delaware after testing positive for COVID-19 Wednesday, the White House said. The Democrats who spoke to Axios say they expect blowout poll numbers after the Republican National Convention concludes in Milwaukee that could spell disaster for Democrats in Congress this November.
"His choice is to be one of history's heroes, or to be sure of the fact that there'll never be a Biden presidential library," one of the president's close friends reportedly told Axios. "I pray that he does the right thing. He's headed that way."
MILWAUKEE - President Biden’s re-election campaign is pushing back against a slew of reports in the past 24 hours that the president has become more receptive in the last couple of days to hearing arguments about why he should drop his 2024 re-election run.
“Our campaign is not working through any scenarios where President Biden is not at the top of the ticket. He is and will be the Democratic nominee, Biden principal deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks told reporters at a news conference Thursday morning near the site of the Republican National Convention.
Fulks emphasized that “the president has said it several times. He’s staying in this race” and “we look forward to him accepting the delegates in Chicago and continuing with this race to talk about what’s at stake.”
Following his disastrous debate performance last month in his face-to-face showdown with former President Trump, the 2024 GOP presidential nominee, the 81-year-old Biden has been facing questions about whether he has the physical and mental capabilities to serve another four years in the most demanding job in the world. And politically, Biden’s been pushing back against a rising chorus of calls to end his campaign from elected Democrats, who are deeply concerned about the possibility of the party not only losing the White House but both houses of Congress in the autumn election.
Asked a second time at the news conference if Biden may consider stepping aside, Fulks responded that the president “is not wavering on anything. The president has made his decision. I don’t to be rude, but I do not know how many more times we can answer that. Joe Biden has said he is running for President of the United States. Our campaign is moving forward.”
{{#rendered}}Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., told Reuters that President Biden is "working towards" a decision on whether he'll continue his re-election bid that is "good for the country."
"Joe Biden has always put the country first. He's done what's best for America...I think he'll keep doing so," Hickenlooper told Reuters in a phone interview late Wednesday. "He's working towards that."
The senator, a former Democratic presidential candidate in 2020 before Biden won the nomination, stopped short of joining the growing list of members of his party explicitly calling on Biden to step aside. Reuters asked Hickenlooper about Biden potentially stopping his re-election campaign.
"That's his decision to make, but certainly there's more and more indications that that would be in the best interests of the country, I think," Hickenlooper responded.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., the former Speaker of the House, had a second phone conversation with President Biden to insist that polling shows he cannot win against former President Trump, CNN reported, citing four sources briefed on the call. Pelosi reportedly told Biden that he could ruin Democrats' prospects of winning the House in November if he stays in the race.
One source reportedly described Biden's response as defensive. Another source said the president told Pelosi that he's seen polling data that shows he can defeat Trump. Biden reportedly at one point asked his longtime adviser, Mike Donilon, to join the call to discuss the data. The call reportedly happened within the past week.
It's the second known phone conversation between the president and Pelosi since Biden's stalling and stumbling debate performance against Trump in Atlanta last month.
Top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer reportedly told President Biden in a "blunt one-on-one conversation" Saturday it would be best if he "bowed out of the race," according to an ABC report on X.
"Chuck Schumer had a blunt one-on-one conversation with Biden Saturday afternoon in Rehoboth. Schumer forcefully made the case that it would be best if Biden bowed out of the race," ABC News chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl wrote. "Schumer's office wouldn't comment on the specifics of the conversation, telling me only, ‘Leader Schumer conveyed the views of his caucus.’"
The Senate majority leader's office issued a similar response obtained by Fox News Digital on Wednesday, but waved off ABC's report.
"Unless ABC’s source is Senator Chuck Schumer or President Joe Biden the reporting is idle speculation," a spokesperson for Sen. Schumer said. "Leader Schumer conveyed the views of his caucus directly to President Biden on Saturday."
The news comes as the New York Democrat pushed for the Democratic National Convention's delay as questions persist about President Biden's 2024 candidacy due to concerns over his mental acuity, according to multiple sources.
This is an excerpt from an article by Fox News Digital's Jamie Joseph.
{{#rendered}}California delegates for the Democratic Party are reportedly in disarray as debate over the president's chances of re-election threatens to tear the party apart.
Private group chats across multiple social media platforms have been set up to facilitate discussion among the delegates, who almost universally worry that a second Biden term is an impossible sell to voters, according to Politico.
A cache of messages was reportedly leaked to the outlet — only the latest in a deluge of leaks from inside the Biden administration and the wider Democratic Party.
"Obviously, the first step would be that President Biden steps down of his own accord and frees his delegates," DNC delegate Susan Bolle posted in a Facebook group discussing the issue. "We should discuss this. This is a painful experience on every level, but we play an outsized role in history this election. This cannot be left to chance."
This is an excerpt from an article by Fox News Digital's Timothy H.J. Nerozzi.
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