Welp, I hope everyone had a lovely Independence Day—the way things have been going lately, I’m not wholly confident there will be another. Amid a growing push for President Biden to end his presidential bid, even more bad news arrived over the holiday. You'd think the existentially important questions about Biden's presidential fitness and his latest devastating poll numbers would matter to his team—you'd think. Alas, there’s a certain arrogance to the Biden campaign’s apparent refusal to take any of this seriously enough for him to step aside. Instead, they're framing him as an action movie hero who will rise above adversity—even when none of this is about him, really, and is actually about all the rights we stand to lose if (when??) Trump wins in November. But first, here’s what you might’ve missed if you spent Thursday unplugged—as you should have! Democratic governors reportedly told Biden point-blank that his campaign is “irretrievable” on Wednesday, with governors in purple states like New Mexico and Maine expressing concern that they could lose their seats with him at the top of the ticket. Biden didn’t do himself any favors by assuring governors that he’ll be fine so long as he stops doing events after 8 p.m. so he can get enough sleep—nor by going on a radio station and saying he’s “proud to be, as I said, the first vice president, first Black woman, to serve with a Black president.” Then, of course, there was that damning New York magazine article detailing a months-long “conspiracy of silence” to conceal Biden’s mental decline, which has allegedly seen him forget the names of people he’s known for decades and struggle to perform basic presidential tasks. In the report, a guest at a White House event this year recalled feeling unsure whether "they could vote for Biden, since the guest was now open to an idea that they had previously dismissed as right-wing propaganda: The president may not really be the acting president after all." There’s also an alleged Democratic donor revolt fomenting, which has the potential to be the most damning piece of all, especially if other major donors take a page from Abigail Disney and withhold donations until Biden steps aside. Biden’s campaign has yet to offer a single good response to the latest, astoundingly awful polling, which shows Trump leading Biden by nine percentage points among registered voters and by six points among likely voters, while a Wall Street Journal poll showed 80% of voters say Biden is simply too old to run. Biden is currently at a 34% approval rating, down from about 40% a month ago, which… I doubt I have to explain how bad that is, right? On Thursday, a third House Democrat on Thursday called for Biden to step down from the ticket. Holy shit https://t.co/tOhYQ8Vy0K pic.twitter.com/j49oY26gBV — Jerry Iannelli (@jerryiannelli) July 4, 2024 In turn, Biden has only doubled and tripled down. He told White House staff on Wednesday, “I am running. I am the leader of the Democratic Party. No one is pushing me out. I’ve been knocked down before and counted out my whole life. When you get knocked down, you get back up.” For a moment, let’s ignore the absurdity of saying you’ve been “counted out my whole life” when you were elected to Congress at 30. The narrative that Biden has been “knocked down” and simply needs the time, space, and patience of the electorate to get back up is frankly one of the stupidest and most selfish things I’ve ever heard. There’s simply too much at stake for us to take a chance…
