Things That Just Don't Add Up About Biden's Drop Out Announcement
Now that President Biden has officially dropped out of the race, there are a few things that don't quite add up about the weeks—and minutes—leading up to his historic decision.
Transcript
00:00Now that President Biden has officially dropped out of the race, there are a few things that
00:04don't quite add up about the weeks and minutes leading up to his historic decision. Biden
00:09posted a letter on ExSunday declaring his intention to exit the race, saying that while
00:14it was initially his intention to seek re-election, he believed, quote, it is in the best interest
00:19of his party and the country not to do so. And while the letter doesn't say that he dropped
00:24out due to pressure from his party due to concerns about his age and the fallout over
00:28his disastrous performance during the June 27th debate, it's reasonable to assume that
00:33this is precisely why.
00:35We finally beat Medicare.
00:37As for why the 81-year-old Biden held out so long and didn't drop out earlier, it could
00:42simply be because he required a bit of convincing, and his COVID-19 diagnosis on July 17th surely
00:48didn't help matters. It took more than three weeks following the debate for President Biden
00:52to concede that he ought to drop out of the presidential race from June 27th to July 21st.
00:59While three-plus weeks isn't exactly a lot of time to make such a weighty, life-altering
01:03decision, some outlets were asking the very next day after the debate why Biden hadn't
01:08stepped down already.
01:09When you get knocked down, you get back up.
01:13Though there are no official statements explaining why Biden didn't step down earlier, it stands
01:17to reason that the closeness to the November 5th general presidential election has something
01:22to do with the delay, as well as the need to hurry.
01:25Biden was going to be announced as the official Democratic Party presidential candidate at
01:29the Democratic National Convention, which runs from August 19th to the 22nd. This means
01:34that on one hand, Biden had a limited time to make his decision to drop out, especially
01:39considering the need to endorse and prop up another candidate. It also means that because
01:43the DNC is fast approaching, it was already late in the process for the Democratic Party
01:48to swap candidates. In the end, for better or for worse, Biden waited a bit.
01:52When his dropout letter Biden thanked Vice President Kamala Harris for being an extraordinary
01:57partner, he did not, however, immediately name her as his preferred successor. The conspicuous
02:02absence of an endorsement briefly caused a panic among political commentators, who thought
02:07that the race was now wide open in an unprecedented way.
02:10There are significant questions about what this process looks like moving forward.
02:13But emotions were quickly calmed when about a half-hour later, the president followed
02:17up with a separate post endorsing his VP run in his stead. Now, it's not exactly sketchy
02:22or weird for President Biden to not announce who he would endorse right off the bat. After
02:27all, it's easy to see how his announcement letter on X has one purpose, and an endorsement
02:31of a successor has another purpose, and so the two announcements were made separately.
02:36Biden's official endorsement of Vice President Harris came 27 minutes later, also on X. He
02:41wrote,
02:42"...I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party
02:46this year."
02:47And yet, in our modern news cycle, a half-hour can be a long time. The Washington Post even
02:52published a post-Biden dropout pre-Harris endorsement list of potential picks for the
02:57DNC's presidential nomination in that very narrow window of time, which is still viable
03:02since the official Democratic presidential candidate won't be chosen until the DNC in
03:07August.
03:08It's possible that if Biden endorsed Harris at the same time as when he made his dropout
03:12announcement, he might have saved the public some confusion, while also strengthening the
03:16party's case for Harris as POTUS.