Big money Democratic donors started to withhold cash from the Biden campaign with the slogan “No more dough until no more Joe” as doubt about the president’s viability grew — with the embattled leader leaning more heavily on convicted First Son Hunter through the chaos.
The father-son relationship has been almost “Shakespearean,” a source told the Washington Post, which recounted the donor revolt and how even the president’s shocked aides passed around video of their boss feebly negotiating the steps on Air Force One.
Funders looking to replace Biden with a newer, potentially more viable model even tried to pay for new polling on alternative candidates and funneled cash to elected officials who called on him to bow out, according to the outlet.
And inside the White House, some advisers tried to do damage control by strategizing on how to lock in policy wins ahead of a second term for Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump — instead of how to get their boss another four years on the job, an official briefed on the issue told the newspaper.
“The polling isn’t good, and it feels like things are just getting worse every day,” a campaign advisor admitted.
One lawmaker added to the discontent over Biden’s mental fitness, noting to the outlet they recently saw a change in the president after meeting with him multiple times over the last four years.
During their last face-to-face, the lawmaker claimed, Biden was speaking so quietly that he could barely be heard across the table on Air Force One.
A third lawmaker said the president was frequently trailing off in recent weeks, and that he referred to them by the wrong name.
Even so, “there is not a practical way to prevent him from being the nominee if he wants to be the nominee,” according to Jeff Weaver, the former political strategist for Sen. Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaigns.
Despite reports the Biden clan gathered to discuss stepping off the campaign trail, sources insisted to the Washington Post the family was a united front behind the aging patriarch and Biden himself remained unbowed.
“He believes he can still win,” a lawmaker who recently interacted with the president told the Washington Post.
Biden was said to be seething about the push for his ouster while recovering at his beach house in Delaware — and considered former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as its mastermind, close allies of the president said Friday night.
On a call with Al Sharpton shortly after the disastrous June 27 debate, Biden insisted “we’ve got to keep going,” the reverend recalled.
Over time, the debate over whether Biden should stay in the race has become an issue in itself, Sharpton explained.
“It undercuts potential enthusiasm. It confuses people who want him to fight,” he said. “If he steps down, then what? If you have an open convention, couldn’t that be a disaster?”
Trump operatives in key states were already working on how to keep Biden in the race, believing a weaker candidate will mean victory for their candidate.
“If Democrats want to win Georgia, they’d be better off with a potted plant at the top of their ticket,” said Cody Hall, a top adviser to Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp.
Biden was also supposedly rambling and incoherent during a testy Zoom call during which he confronted decorated war veteran Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.).
The call ended just before the assassination attempt on Donald Trump in Pennsylvania – which stopped the Democrats involved from immediately voicing their discontent, according to one report this week.
Democratic House polls showed Biden significantly behind his 2020 margins in essential districts, while Senate polls had him trailing statewide Dems by double digits in battleground states, the Washington Post reported.
“If he were to demur, then the question becomes: What’s the process after that? Is it a coronation of Kamala Harris, which a lot of people are making the case for, or do we have some sort of truncated process?” Weaver proposed.
James Carville, a Bill Clinton strategist and one of the early voices to call for Biden to step down, was also at a loss.
“What they are asking is, ‘How are you going to win this?’” he said of those he spoke to. “No one is over it, and we are moving ahead anyway.”
