The House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said he shared lawmakers’ “insight, heartfelt perspectives and conclusions about the path forward” in a private meeting with Joe Biden yesterday.

The meeting came after more than a dozen House Democrats publicly called on the president to end his bid for re-election after his stumbling performance against Donald Trump in their first debate.

Jeffries had promised that he would talk to Biden after speaking with all of the 213 Democrats in the House of Representatives, and, in a letter to lawmakers today, he indicated that he has done so, without elaborating on Biden’s response.

Deep-pocketed Democratic donors are putting multimillion-dollar pledges on hold and saying they won’t hand over the money until Joe Biden abandons his re-election campaign, the New York Times reports.

Others are holding off on giving any more money to Future Forward, the largest Super Pac supporting the president’s campaign.

  • PugJesus@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    28
    ·
    5 months ago

    Harris is the obvious choice, though I would be thrilled if it went to someone else. The DNC, unfortunately, will have to discuss amongst the delegates who will get the final nod. What’s important is that we have unity going forward - which is one of the reasons why it’s so important for Biden to step down and get onboard with this.

      • PugJesus@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        20
        ·
        5 months ago

        Yeah. Or rather, Biden shouldn’t have announced he was running for a second term, since as soon as he announced, any serious contenders cooled their ambitions. I understand that you don’t get into politics without a little bit of an ego problem, but it really fucked us.

    • protist@mander.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      10
      ·
      edit-2
      5 months ago

      Harris is the only candidate who would be able to access all the money the Biden campaign has already. Anyone else would start from scratch

      • PugJesus@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        5 months ago

        Which is why Harris needs to be onboard too. And, unfortunately, one of several reasons why she’s the most likely candidate.

        • Zaktor@sopuli.xyz
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          5 months ago

          The issue is contribution limits and what it can be spent on. Harris in control of the money, but not a candidate, means $5k goes to the new candidate and the remaining hundreds of millions become an outside funding entity. That can’t pay for staff’s salaries or do other sorts of direct spending. It’s not an insurmountable hurdle, but it is a pretty meaningful concern. On the plus side, people’s donation limits would be reset.

      • ShepherdPie@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        5 months ago

        She’s just as unlikable as Biden and Clinton. It would be pointless to switch to her when she doesn’t bring any enthusiasm from voters.

      • girlfreddy@lemmy.caOP
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        5 months ago

        If the DNC doesn’t like Sanders - enough that they manipulated his defeat to Clinton - just how receptive do you think they are to AOC being their candidate?

    • ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      5 months ago

      He could full out resign, putting Harris in office and be able to appoint a new VP that inspires more confidence than Harris. Could satisfy party brass who want to control the appointment for getting Biden out.

      Or he could drop out of the race and endorse Harris at an open convention which would be more democratic.

      Hold a national primary over the next month.

      • polonius-rex@kbin.run
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        8
        ·
        5 months ago

        people want to replace biden because they don’t think he can win the election, not because they want harris as president

        why would biden saying “no totally trust me guys i’ll step down for harris after i’ve won” make him any more likely to win, especially after he already told the world he’d be a one-term president?

        • prole@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          5 months ago

          I think they were suggesting that he resign before the election, and Harris chooses a new VP

      • protist@mander.xyz
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        ·
        5 months ago

        The problem is the convention is happening after the ballot deadline in Ohio, which has historically been waived by the Ohio legislature for both parties, but which has not this year with Republicans in charge. That’s why there was going to get a virtual roll call before the convention to nominate Biden. There needs to be a nominee solidified and nominated before the convention or risk having no Democratic candidate for president on the Ohio ballot

      • TokenBoomer@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        5 months ago

        That makes too much sense so it will never happen. My vote is for a “Thunderdome Convention.” And we all know Buttigieg would wipe the floor with his Gramsci quotes.

    • CaptainKickass@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      5 months ago

      Harris would lose. She has too much baggage, real.or imagined. And as much as I hate it, this country isn’t going to elect a black woman any time soon. 🤦🏽

      • polonius-rex@kbin.run
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        10
        ·
        5 months ago

        she has baggage for the left, but that the right would probably find it very difficult to attack

        “she went too hard on criminals” isn’t exactly something they can use to their advantage

        • bobs_monkey@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          5 months ago

          While I agree, the cold unfortunate reality is that a black woman is a nonstarter for a significant portion of the US population. Being a woman is a hurdle enough, being a black woman is a hell of a climb.

      • PugJesus@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        5 months ago

        We elected a black man in 2008. A woman won the popular vote in 2016.

        I’m inclined to agree she has an uphill fight, and that I would much prefer other candidates - if we’re going to have an uphill battle, let’s at least have a charismatic candidate - but Biden is… not really viable at this point.

    • TokenBoomer@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      5 months ago

      I’m subscribed to DNC donor lists and get texts 3, sometimes 4 times a day for donations. Lately, I’ve been getting surveys about Biden’s performance.

      Today, I got a survey asking if I would support Kamala Harris. The entire survey was about Harris. Not sure if that means anything, but it was unexpected. I said I would support her btw, she would enrage Trump.