Here’s Every Democrat Calling on Biden to Drop Out of the Race

Panic over Joe Biden’s age and mental fitness has consumed the Democratic Party since the president’s abysmal debate performance in late June, during which he appeared dumbfounded and frail through the majority of his first 2024 matchup against Donald Trump. Since the face-off, droves of private-sector leaders, donors, and consultants have urged Biden to call it quits, looking for alternatives to a candidate that they openly describe as “comatose” and “dead.”

So far, 34 Democratic lawmakers have formally called on the president to exit the race, and more may soon join them. Some high-profile Democrats, including former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, and former President Barack Obama have signaled behind closed doors that the president’s time leading the party is over. Still, others are reportedly “not budging” until Biden makes another egregious mistake—though the level of mistake required is aboundingly unclear.

Here’s the list of liberal politicians who have called on Biden to throw in the towel.

House of Representatives:

• Rep. Morgan McGarvey (July 19)
• Rep. Greg Landsman (July 19)
• Rep. Betty McCollum (July 19)
• Rep. Zoe Lofgren (July 19)
• Rep. Jared Huffman (July 19)
• Rep. Marc Veasey (July 19)
• Rep. Chuy Garcia (July 19)
• Rep. Marc Pocan (July 19)
• Rep. Adam Schiff (July 17)
• Rep. Mike Levin (July 12)
• Rep. Brittany Pettersen (July 12)
• Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (July 11)
• Rep. Eric Sorensen (July 11)
• Rep. Scott Peters (July 11)
• Rep. Jim Himes (July 11)
• Rep. Ed Case (July 11)
• Rep. Greg Stanton (July 11)
• Rep. Bradley Schneider (July 11)
• Rep. Hillary J. Scholten (July 11)
• Rep. Earl Blumenauer (July 10)
• Rep. Pat Ryan (July 10)
• Rep. Mikie Sherrill (July 9)
• Rep. Joseph Morelle (July 7)
• Rep. Adam Smith (July 7)
• Rep. Mark Takano (July 7)
• Rep. Angie Craig (July 6)
• Rep. Jamie Raskin (July 6)
• Rep. Mike Quigley (July 5)
• Rep. Seth Moulton (July 4)
• Rep. Raúl Grijalva (July 3)
• Rep. Lloyd Doggett (July 2)

Senate:

• Sen. Martin Heinrich (July 19)
• Sen. Jon Tester (July 18)
• Sen. Peter Welch (July 10)

This story has been updated.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries met with President Biden Thursday evening when, according to a letter issued by Jeffries on Friday, they talked about a lot and decided on nothing.

“In my conversation with President Biden, I directly expressed the full breadth of insight, heartfelt perspectives, and conclusions about the path forward that the Caucus has shared in our recent time together,” Jeffries wrote to his Democratic colleagues, describing conversations in the Democratic House Caucus as “candid, clear-eyed and comprehensive.”

“As House Democrats have done throughout this Congress, we will continue to work in the best interests of everyday Americans. Thank you for your continued leadership in service of the communities we are privileged to represent.”

The letter avoids direct mentions of what Biden and Jeffries spoke about, or what the outcome of the meeting was.

Jeffries has been holding meetings with top Democrats and the Congressional Black Caucus in the weeks since Biden’s disastrous debate performance. While he’s avoided making any definitive statements, closed-door Democratic meetings have been described as “an insult to funerals,” with Jeffries absorbing various concerns about Biden’s fitness to serve, pitches for Kamala Harris to replace Biden, and declarations of support for Biden. To date, 18 House Democrats and one Democratic senator have publicly called on Biden to step aside, including four independents who caucus with Democrats. Privately, influential Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama have reportedly expressed concerns about Biden’s candidacy, with Pelosi providing an explosive nonanswer on Wednesday morning about a need for Biden “to decide if he is going to run.”

Following a middling NATO press conference on Thursday evening with some oof-worthy gaffes, one Democratic operative described the state of the party to Politico as “in purgatory.” Jeffries’s letter announcing that he passed along opinions from Democrats to Biden appears to be a continuation of the party’s nonmovement, as Biden has firmly indicated he has no intention of stepping aside despite continued calls for him to do so.

Representative James Clyburn pledged his support to whatever Joe Biden decides, including whether he changes his mind.

NBC’s Savannah Guthrie asked Clyburn Friday morning about whether he’s leaving “the door open just a little bit” for continued questions about Biden staying on as the Democratic nominee for president.

“I took him at his word, and that’s why I am all in,” Clyburn said, referring to Biden’s stated desire to stay on as president. “I’m ridin’ with Biden, no matter what direction he goes, no matter what method he takes; I’m with Joe Biden.”

But the South Carolina Democrat offered a caveat.

“And if he were to change his mind, I’ll just answer the question, I would be all in for the vice president,” Clyburn said, referring to Kamala Harris.

With that answer, Clyburn somehow both affirmed his support for Biden but also for Harris to succeed him. He further elaborated on what he meant when NBC’s Craig Melvin asked him, “Should the conversation about the president getting out of this race, should that conversation continue?”

“No it shouldn’t,” Clyburn said. “The conversation should focus on the record of this administration, on the alternative to his election, and let Joe Biden continue to make his own decisions about his future. He’s earned that right, and I am going to give him that much respect. If he decides to change his mind later on, then we would respond to that.”

“If Project 2025 were to become the law in any form, that is where our focus ought to be,” Clyburn added.

Clyburn’s latest remarks build on what he said nearly two weeks ago after Biden’s poor debate performance, when he gave a stronger endorsement of Harris. Now Clyburn still supports Harris, but only if Biden were to decide himself to step down. On Thursday, Biden held a rare press conference that didn’t allay many people’s concerns about his fitness for office. He stumbled starting off, and concluded chaotically after he attempted to answer a question about Harris replacing him. This press conference may have won over Clyburn, but he’s clearly still giving Biden room to drop out.

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is facing renewed blowback for allegedly sexually assaulting a former family babysitter after he reportedly decided to shoot her a late-night apology text.

The former babysitter, Eliza Cooney, accused Kennedy in a bombshell Vanity Fair piece of rubbing her leg, reading her diary, asking her to rub lotion on his back, and trapping her in the pantry and groping her, all on separate occasions in 1998, when she was 23 and Kennedy was 45.

Kennedy apparently thought the best way to smooth things over was via text. “I have no memory of this incident but I apologize sincerely for anything I ever did that made you feel uncomfortable or anything I did or said that offended you or hurt your feelings,” Kennedy wrote in a text message to Cooney, sent just after midnight on July 4 and obtained by The Washington Post.

“I never intended you any harm. If I hurt you, it was inadvertent. I feel badly for doing so.”

The presidential candidate then proceeded to invite Cooney to continue the conversation either by telephone or “preferably, face to face.

“I recognize that this might not be possible. I have no agenda for sending this text other than making the most sincere and ernest [sic] amends,” Kennedy added.

The message was not well received—as unsolicited, late-night texts from men usually are.

“It was disingenuous and arrogant,” Cooney told the Post in reference to the message. “I’m not sure how somebody has a true apology for something that they don’t admit to recalling. I did not get a sense of remorse.”

And she was further surprised by the invitation to continue the conversation with her alleged abuser in person.

“Meet ‘face to face’? What woman wants to do that?” Cooney added.

Kennedy initially brushed off the accusations in an interview on Breaking Points, chalking up the sexual harassment claims to his “very, very rambunctious youth.”

“In terms of the other allegations, listen, I have said this from the beginning: I am not a church boy. I am not running like that,” Kennedy said. “I said in my announcement speech that I have so many skeletons in my closet that if they could all vote I could run for king of the world.”

He also derided the rest of the Vanity Fair exposé, which included a photo of Kennedy posing next to what veterinarians identified as a barbecued dog, calling the article “a lot of garbage.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson relied on some flimsy facts to back the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE, Act, to make it harder for noncitizens to vote in the U.S. elections, something that is of course, already illegal.

The bill, which would require a Real ID or U.S. passport for voting rather than the standard driver’s license, passed the Republican-led House Wednesday, but it was built on a false premise and backed by baseless claims.

To attract support for the bill, Johnson circulated a white paper that included some claims about voting by undocumented immigrants—that aren’t backed up by any evidence, according to the Ohio Capital Journal.

In one section, Johnson’s handout referred to Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, who had ordered 137 noncitizens to be removed from the state’s voter rolls. But LaRose has yet to provide any actual evidence of illegally cast ballots.

LaRose even acknowledged in a May press release that some of those people could’ve been included as “the result of an honest mistake.”

“These may be well-meaning people trying to pursue the American dream, and communication barriers sometimes result in a registration form being submitted in error,” LaRose said. “We need to help them get that cleared up before an accidental registration becomes an illegal vote that could result in a felony conviction or even deportation.”

Under federal law, the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles is required to offer voter registration forms to state residents seeking any service. As a result, some forms are filled out by noncitizens, who even mark themselves as ineligible to vote, but the forms are still processed anyway. Another possible explanation is that those voters have been naturalized but have yet to visit the BMV to officially change their status.

If the evidence isn’t really adding up, there’s a good reason for that: Noncitizens don’t really vote in state or federal elections. In 2016, noncitizen votes accounted for just 0.0001 percent of the votes cast, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.

Noncitizen voting is a right-wing conspiracy, though, and in reality, the only ones concocting a scheme to fake votes in the last election were in Donald Trump’s camp.

The SAVE Act is ultimately doomed to fail, but that may be by design. It will never pass the Democratic-led Senate, and President Joe Biden has already promised to veto it. But its failure sets the stage for Republicans to run rampant with claims of widespread voter fraud in the upcoming election, even though the numbers don’t support it.