Former President Donald Trump seized on President Joe Biden’s decision to end his bid for reelection, saying he had never been fit to serve — an attack on his former rival that was immediately followed by other Republicans calling on the president to step down from office as well.
“Crooked Joe Biden was not fit to run for President, and is certainly not fit to serve — And never was!” Trump wrote on social media shortly after Biden announced that he was ending his campaign.
The former president’s post did not mention Vice President Kamala Harris, whom Biden swiftly endorsed to take his place in the race. But Trump and his allies frequently criticized her during the Republican convention last week.
The former president, who formally accepted his party’s nomination Thursday night in Milwaukee, also sought to raise money off Biden’s departure, sending a message to would-be small-dollar donors saying that Biden had “quit the race in COMPLETE DISGRACE!”
Trump accused Biden’s allies of having known for months that the president was unfit to serve in his role because of age and health concerns. Other Republicans quickly followed Trump’s lead in calling for Biden to step down.
“If Joe Biden is not fit to run for President, he is not fit to serve as President,” House Speaker Mike Johnson wrote on the social platform X.
Republicans have been planning a strategy aimed at Harris, presuming that she would be the most likely replacement for Biden. Trump himself did not immediately mention her after Biden’s announcement, but the party’s messaging machinery did.
@RNCResearch, a social media account managed by the GOP and the Trump campaign, was critical of Harris, accusing her of disregarding concerns over Biden’s fitness.
Trump campaign advisers Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles similarly attempted put blame on Harris, issuing a statement calling her the “Enabler in Chief.”
“There is no distance between the two” running mates, the statement said.
Trump more broadly denounced Democrats and the “Washington establishment” for trying to keep Biden in the race — comments that were a reversal from his remarks Saturday night during a rally in Michigan, when he argued that party leaders such as Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California, the former House speaker, were trying to undemocratically push Biden off the ticket.
“This guy goes, and he gets the votes, and now we’ll take it away,” Trump said during the rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
