As speculation mounts over President Joe Biden’s reelection plans in 2024, Democratic insiders said they don’t see a benefit in making an announcement this early.
These Democrats also said they intend to back Biden in 2024, indicating that the party would quickly coalesce behind the president despite chatter this summer about possible alternatives at the top of the ticket.
Scott Brennan, an Iowa Democratic national committeeman and former state party chairman, said Biden had “earned the right” to seek another term.
“The president has earned the right to make a decision, and if he decides to run for reelection, we all need to get right in behind him,” Brennan told the Washington Examiner.
But the Iowa Democrat said he didn’t think the timing would make any difference. He said he had not heard anything about planning for a campaign inside the national party.
BIDEN RECEIVED RECOMMENDATION TO DECLASSIFY FULL KHASHOGGI INTELLIGENCE REPORT
“Everybody’s so focused on the midterms and how critical those are,” Brennan said.
Richard Harpootlian, a longtime Biden supporter who chaired the South Carolina Democratic Party, told the Washington Examiner that Biden should run and would have his backing.
“Yes, he should run. Yes, I will support him,” Harpootlian said.
In August, people planning Biden’s campaign told Reuters that an early announcement could help bring together political donors and supporters behind the president, boxing out potential rivals, and unify Democrats behind his agenda.
But others have speculated that Biden might not run at all.
Another former swing-state state party chairman who did not wish to be named said he does not think Biden will seek a second term.
“I don’t think he’s going to run,” he told the Washington Examiner. Still, the Democrat and longtime Biden supporter said announcing a decision would do little to change the party’s fortunes ahead of November.
“I don’t see a benefit to Democrats on the ballot now, so I’d wait until after the lame duck if I were he,” the former chairman said.
Polls indicate Democrats are split over the issue.
In a recent Marquette Law School survey, 52% of Democrats supported a Biden reelection bid in 2024, while 48% opposed it.
A CNN poll over the summer found that 75% of Democrats and lean-Democratic voters want a new nominee, with 32% saying they don’t want the president to be reelected, up from 16%. Twenty-four percent fear Biden won’t win.
Just 23% of Iowa voters said in July that they hoped Biden would run for reelection, a Des Moines Register poll found.
But Biden, who will turn 80 after the November elections, appears to be closing in on a decision, with sources telling NBC News that the campaign would plan to rely on the Democratic National Committee’s resources and infrastructure.
The results of the November elections are expected to influence the White House’s campaign planning and staffing decisions, as well as how quickly Biden turns toward 2024, sources familiar with the efforts told NBC News. But a formal “green light” is not expected until after the holidays.
First lady Jill Biden told the Today Show last month that the Bidens had “not yet” held a family discussion about a second term but leaned on the president’s message that he “has kept true” to his promises since taking office. “I think he just needs to keep going,” she added.
The family sit-down has precipitated Biden’s earlier decisions on whether to run for president.
When Harpootlian joined a Draft Biden super PAC in 2015 to urge the then vice president to step into the race, Joe Biden’s sister said the family had yet to get together to discuss it.
In early 2019, Joe Biden said he was still deliberating the possibility but that his family had reached “a consensus” on the topic after a family meeting.
Joe Biden and his top aides have said the president intends to seek a second term but shied away from an unequivocal declaration, in part to avoid triggering campaign finance laws.
During an interview with 60 Minutes, the president said it was “much too early” to make a final decision and that he would wait until after the midterm elections.
Yet a new report suggests the president may have already made up his mind.
Posing for a photograph with the Rev. Al Sharpton in early September, Joe Biden told him, “I’m going to do it again,” according to an account relayed by a Sharpton aide to NBC News.
Asked about Sharpton’s telling, the White House reiterated Tuesday that the president intends to seek reelection.
Joe Biden’s comments to Sharpton suggest a willingness to speak more definitively about his intentions with allies who helped propel him in the 2020 race.
Black voters were key to Joe Biden’s success in the Democratic primary in 2020, helping him win the South Carolina primary after failing to win in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada. Black voters again helped Joe Biden on Super Tuesday, launching him to victory across the South.
The president sought Sharpton’s endorsement in 2020 before announcing his candidacy, a moment that Sharpton said in September convinced him Joe Biden was running. The president later told Sharpton that it was true that the reverend was among the first to know in 2020, according to NBC News.
And the president lately has sought to dispel questions about his age, recently telling 60 Minutes, “Just watch me,” when asked to respond to critics who question whether he is up to the rigors of the job.
The issue resurfaced after the president called out for deceased congresswoman Jackie Walorski (R-IN) during a White House event last week.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
While the president privately apologized to the family after the episode, Walorski’s brother told the New York Post, the moment prompted questions about the president’s mental acuity. Weeks earlier in a statement, Joe Biden had described being “shocked and saddened” by Walorski’s death.
Allies defended the president, with Harpootlian, a South Carolina state senator, blaming the “Where’s Jackie?” incident on bad staff work.
