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A group of prominent conservative and ex-Republican opponents of Donald Trump will meet with senior Biden campaign officials in Washington on Monday, just days after a televised presidential debate raised serious questions among many of the president’s supporters about whether Joe Biden should continue his campaign for re-election.
Five people familiar with the meeting confirmed Shipping Policy that the meeting was planned before Biden’s disastrous performance on Thursday night. However, multiple members of the group will tell the campaign that the president should withdraw from his race against Trump, reflecting a growing lack of confidence that the 81-year-old Democrat can defeat the presumptive Republican nominee. The Biden campaign did not respond to a request for comment about the meeting.
Among those listed to attend the Washington rally are former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, attorney George Conway, veteran Republican operative Mike Murphy, commentators Bill Kristol and Charlie Sykes, and strategist Sarah Longwell. In recent days, several of these Never Trumpers have publicly called for Biden to withdraw from the race or consider doing so.
“I keep coming back to a conclusion I reached a while back but didn’t think was a realistic enough scenario to articulate,” Conway tweeted Sunday night. “For the good of the country and their own good, both major party presidential candidates should withdraw.”
These experts and operatives have taken a number of professional risks to support the Democratic president; The fact that they are now urging him to step aside is no small development. While many disgruntled Republicans believe the Democratic nominee has not done enough to earn their votes, Biden has attracted some ex-GOP supporters who believe Trump’s potential return to the White House poses a unique threat. Last Wednesday, a day before the presidential debate, Biden received some important, if predictable, endorsements from Republicans who have found themselves at odds with the leader of their own party.
At a news conference in the lobby of the Georgia capitol, former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger and former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan announced their support for Biden. Yes, they acknowledged policy disagreements with the president. But they said their overriding concerns about Trump prompted them to back a Democrat for president for the first time.
“We want someone who will defend democracy,” Kinzinger told reporters in Atlanta.
“This was an easy decision for me,” Duncan added.
Since the debate, Kinzinger has not shied away from saying Biden performed poorly, but reiterated that he would still vote for the president over Trump. Still, the former congressman has expressed his wish that Democrats will weigh their options moving forward. “At a time when literal democracy is in peril,” he wrote Friday, “Democrats need a family meeting on how best to defend this country, and what role Biden plays in that crucial effort.”
Kristol said on Sunday that he would still vote for Biden if he is the one the Democrats put forward against Trump. “But he shouldn’t be the nominee,” Kristol said of the president on ABC News’ This week“We are [Biden] a lot for what he did in 2020 to defeat Donald Trump, and we owe him a lot for being a good president for three and a half years. We don’t owe him four more years in the White House. And he should step aside.”
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