President Joe Biden has announced that he is dropping out of the 2024 presidential race and will focus now on serving out the rest of his term.
Biden, once the Democrats’ presumptive nominee, made the nearly unprecedented announcement in a statement on Sunday after some elected Democrats spent weeks campaigning for him to withdraw, warning of the grave danger of the president losing to Donald Trump.
“It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your President,” Biden said. “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 said that he would speak further about his decision in an address this week. Although his initial statement did not include an endorsement, shortly after it was published he said he backed Vice President Kamala Harris becoming the party’s nominee.
“I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year,” Biden said on X.
The decision to drop out will force Democrats to scramble for a new name to replace Biden’s at the top of their presidential ticket. As vice president, Harris is viewed by many as the likely “heir apparent” to the party’s nomination. But other Democrats — including Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and former First Lady Michelle Obama — are also considered potential replacements.
If Harris is chosen, she would be the first Black woman and first Asian person to become the presidential nominee of a major party in U.S. history.
In the weeks leading up to this decision, Biden had faced a wave of calls from voters, donors and Democrats to step aside concerns about his mental acuity and his cratering support from polls. Biden is the second president in U.S. history to withdraw from the presidential election as the presumptive nominee for his party, with the only other being Lyndon B. Johnson.
Harris secured decent polling numbers in hypothetical head-to-head matchups against Donald Trump — far better than Biden has been polling since his disastrous debate performance in late June, which sparked concerns about his cognitive health after he struggled to articulate coherent thoughts.
Since that debate, commentators and Democratic party insiders have questioned Biden’s ability to win against Donald Trump — and his ability to serve in office for another full term were he able to win in November.
After a multitude of Democratic lawmakers, pundits, donors and polling data showcased he would have a difficult chance of winning against Trump again, Biden ultimately determined that the best course of action was to step aside and make way for another candidate — but only after insisting for weeks that he could still mount a successful campaign.
Though calls within the Democratic Party for Biden to step aside ramped up in recent weeks, many progressives advocates and voters had been telling Biden to pull out of the race for months due to his support for Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, which has alienated a significant portion of his base.
Polling demonstrated that, had he remained in the race, Biden would have been one of the most unpopular incumbent presidents to ever run for a second term. It’s not difficult to see why, as the one-term president leaves behind a dismal legacy after half a century of serving in Washington, D.C.
Many voters will forever remember Biden as the man who has sustained Israel’s brutal assault of Gaza, having spent much of his last year in office funneling weapons to Israel and skirting domestic and international law to run diplomatic cover for the country under international investigation for genocide.
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