President Joe Biden is looking to fall back on black and minority support to prevent his ousting, portraying the effort as the doing of elite white liberals.
Following one of his worst weeks as president after a disastrous debate performance, repeated blows have brought his entire candidacy into question. But as the number of major Democratic figures demanding him to drop out grows, Biden is falling back on his black and union allies to save his candidacy. The president’s campaign is increasingly pitching calls for him to drop out as a racial matter, saying that elitist, out-of-touch, white liberals want him to step down while black and minority voters want him to stay.
“The people Joe Biden fights for — middle-class labor union members, Blacks, Latinos — they know he fights for them, and they’re going to stay in the fight for him,” close Biden adviser Anita Dunn told Politico.
Former Louisiana Rep. Cedric Richmond, a co-chairman of Biden’s campaign, cast the struggle more openly along racial lines.
“I think it’s interesting that not one African American member [of Congress] has called on the president to step down,” Richmond said, warning white lawmakers that they “risk alienating some of their base” by turning their backs on the president.
He focused his attack on a new favorite target of the Biden campaign, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), saying he “wouldn’t be rushing to do that if I was from Virginia.”
Biden campaign co-chairman Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) said that he was being bombarded by calls from grassroots supporters begging Biden to stay in the race.
“Local elected officials, civic leaders, grass-roots folks, mostly from Delaware but also around the country” have a “genuine and deep love for our president,” he told the outlet.
Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT), the leading Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, told the publication the opposite, saying he had gotten hundreds of texts and emails about Biden’s age and mental acuity, with none of them wanting the president to stay.
Several black lawmakers have taken up Biden’s standard in the period of doubt, including Reps. Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Frederica Wilson (D-FL).
“Any ‘leader’ calling for President Biden to drop out needs to get their priorities straight and stop undermining this incredible actual leader who has delivered real results for our country,” Wilson said in a statement to the Hill. “And when you contrast that with a dangerous figure like Donald Trump pushing a radical agenda to be dictator on day one and destroy our democracy, we must do everything in our power to defeat him; Joe Biden and Kamala Harris is the ticket to do just that.”
Despite the Biden campaign’s claim that calls for him to drop out are driven almost entirely by white liberals, recent polls have found growing concerns among black voters as well. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll found that 53% of black voters believe Biden is too old to be an effective president, compared to 44% who believe Trump is too old. The sentiment was even stronger among Hispanic voters, with 83% believing Biden is too old, a higher percentage than white voters.
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One problem with Biden’s new line of attack is Vice President Kamala Harris would most likely take his position if the president were to drop out. Harris would be the first black woman to be president, something many black voters would prefer over Biden.
Reflecting Biden’s new approach of falling back on minority voters, the president is set to take part in more minority-centered events, such as speaking at the NAACP convention in Las Vegas in tangent with the Republican National Convention and doing impromptu events with minority lawmakers in between NATO meetings. On Sunday, he spoke to a black congregation at a church in Philadelphia.
