New York Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez last Monday threw her support behind President Joe Biden despite rising calls for him to drop out of the 2024 race following his alarming performance at the June 27 CNN debate in Atlanta.
When asked by a reporter outside of the Capitol about the concerns over the president’s health, the progressive Democrat said she had spoken “extensively” with the president over the weekend and that he “made it clear” that he was remaining in the race.
She argued the president had repeatedly reiterated his intention to continue running and concluded that the “matter is closed.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s fellow Squad member Ilhan Omar (D-MN) came out early to voice her support for the president, telling a local Minnesota outlet that Biden was the country’s only chance to protect abortion and “make sure our democracy is intact” by stopping Donald Trump for retaking the White House.
Omar insisted that Democrats had to do everything they could to push Biden “across the finish line.”
Fellow Squad member Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) also affirmed that she supported Biden’s decision to remain in the race.
Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, released a statement on June 8 acknowledging concerns about whether Biden was up to the task of defeating Donald Trump and noted that both the president and Vice President Harris “were elected by the voters.”
In a June 10 interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” former speaker Nancy Pelosi appeared to waffle when asked if she supported the president’s decision to remain in the race.
Pelosi said it would be “up to the president” to decide whether he was going to run and said Democrat lawmakers were “encouraging him to make that decision” soon because time was running out.
That same day, Vermont Senator Peter Welch became the first Senate Democrat to publicly call for the president to drop out of the race.
Welch wrote in an op-ed published in the Washington Post that Biden must withdraw “for the good of the country.”
