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Did President Joe Biden make the correct decision when he chose not to seek reelection? Apparently so, judging by the reaction from Democrats and Republicans alike.
On the Democratic side, there was a palpable sense of relief that Biden stepped aside without causing a rift in the party. Had he waited much longer, or if he had been more combative about it, a fairly amicable process could have turned messy quite quickly.
Instead, Biden will have preserved his legacy as the man who stopped Donald Trump once — and then made way for another candidate when it became obvious that he could not do so again.
This sentiment was reflected in countless statements from Democrats praising the president and his accomplishments.
On the grassroots level, the party’s supporters seemed to let out a collective breath now that they no longer have to worry about whether their presidential candidate will stumble — both literally and figuratively — during any public appearance.
Democratic voters made their feelings about Biden’s decision known by opening their wallets.
The fundraising platform ActBlue announced Sunday night that, within hours after Biden announced his decision and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, it processed nearly $50 million in donations.
And over on the Republican side?
Well, they did not take the news as well, which seems to confirm that Biden made the right choice for his party.
After spending years maligning the president, his policies, and his family, they all of a sudden realized that their preferred opponent in the November election had disappeared.
GOP nominee Donald Trump had a particularly tough time as reality sunk in.
“So, we are forced to spend time and money on fighting Crooked Joe Biden, he polls badly after having a terrible debate, and quits the race. Now we have to start all over again,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform. “Shouldn’t the Republican Party be reimbursed for fraud in that everybody around Joe, including his doctors and the Fake News Media, knew he was not capable of running for, or being, President? Just askin’?”
If you are wondering, “just askin’” is not a question, and the GOP will not get reimbursed for the poor decisions it made when it tailored its entire campaign to vilifying an old man whose political future had always been uncertain.
That was just one of several posts the former president directed at Biden, and not his likely new opponent.
For example, the ever-conspiratorial Trump also suggested that the president was not, in fact, sick.
“Biden never had Covid,” he wrote. “He is a threat to Democracy!”
Trump, the only US president in history to have attempted a coup, is an expert on being a threat to democracy. However, he did not specify how a candidate bowing out for the good of his party (and the country) prior to being nominated constitutes such a threat.
Other Republicans also had a tough time dealing with the news.
After essentially saying just hours earlier that Biden was incapable of serving as president, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) suggested that the GOP may sue to keep Biden in the race.
“As I said this morning, every state has their own election system and the Democrat party will face legal challenges in trying to remove Biden from the top of the ticket,” he said.
This reaction really encapsulates how Republicans feel about this development. They want to take legal action because a candidate withdrew from a race before being nominated and before any ballot has been printed.
Good luck with that!
As it turns out, it is not illegal for elected officials to decide at any point that they don’t want to run again.
Of course, Trump adviser Stephen Miller does not see things that way.
“They held a primary! People – they had ballots, they filled out circles! They went to the voting booths! They spent money on advertisements!” a clearly agitated Miller said on Fox News. “Now they just woke up one morning and said, ‘Never mind, we’re canceling the entire primary, we’re getting rid of our candidate, and we’re pretending the election has never even happened.’”
Kamala Harris and the Democrats appear to have lost Stephen Miller's vote. pic.twitter.com/fuXObleTmx
— Frank Luntz (@FrankLuntz) July 22, 2024
Where was this concern for the will of the voters in 2020 when he and others participated in Trump’s coup?
It’s almost as though their motivation is not a concern over intraparty nominating processes…
In any case, on Sunday Biden achieved something that has largely eluded him as president. A vast majority of Democrats and Republicans have demonstrated that he made the right decision… even if they are showing that in different ways.
