Another House Democrat Calls for Biden to Step Aside, Warns Party to Avoid MAGA-Like ‘Loyalty’

Zachary LeemanJul 11th, 2024, 10:00 pm
 

Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) added his name to the growing list of Democratic lawmakers calling for President Joe Biden to drop his reelection campaign.

Himes’ statement on Biden dropped the same night the president pushed back against calls for him to step aside at a NATO press conference. The president insisted he is the best candidate to beat Donald Trump in November amid calls for him to step down over concerns about his health and age.

Himes joined MSNBC’s Alex Wagner on Thursday night following Biden’s press conference — dubbed his “big boy” press conference by the White House — and warned his fellow Democrats to avoid MAGA-like “loyalty” to the president.

The congressman emphasized that his calling for Biden to step aside had nothing to do with his press conference at NATO. Himes even called Biden potentially a “top 10” president in United States history.

“It’s really not about tonight, and one of the sick aspects about this moment is that we are watching every speech, every rally, every debate, and saying, how did he do today? That’s just not the way to think about the presidency of the United States,” he said.

Himes called it a “hard moment” for Democrats because “loyalty and love and emotion are really important in politics.”

He warned Democrats away from being as loyal to Biden as Trump supporters are to the former president, despite being a convicted felon.

“The problem is it can be taken to an extreme. It is loyalty and loyalty alone, unthinking loyalty, that leads 70 million Americans to continue to back an adjudicated felon, rapist, sexual assaulter who has promised an authoritarian regime. That’s an excess of loyalty,” Himes said.

The Democrat added his colleagues — more than a dozen others have already called for Biden to drop out — need to take a “cold, hard look” at the reality of the election otherwise they will be “complicit” in a second Trump administration.

“The stakes are so high that we need to set aside that loyalty and that poetry and that romance and the charge of the light brigade and we all go down together in favor of some really hard-nosed analysis,” Himes said.

Axios reported earlier on Thursday that there is a “flood” of Democratic lawmakers ready with statements distancing themselves from Biden’s campaign, with most waiting to release them until after his NATO press conference.

Himes wrote on X that Biden’s record is “unrivaled,” but he is risking his legacy by staying in the race.

Watch above via MSNBC.

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Zachary Leeman

Zachary Leeman covered pop culture and politics at outlets such as Breitbart, LifeZette, BizPac Review, HollywoodinToto, and others. He is the author of the novel Nigh. He joined Mediaite in 2022.