A new report claims that President Joe Biden will drop out of the presidential race within days.
Journalist Mark Halperin made the claim as multiple reports indicated that more and more Democrats are telling Biden it is time to go.
“This is happening all the sudden,” he said, according to a video posted to X.
“Everyone said it would happen gradually and then all at once, and that’s what’s happening,” he said.
NEW — “According to my sources, President Biden agreed to step down as the Democratic nominee. It will happen as early as this weekend…”
– Mark Halperin on Newsmax just now pic.twitter.com/89vkN7VV0Q
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) July 18, 2024
“According to my sources, President Biden has agreed to step down as the Democratic nominee,” he said, adding that this “could happen as early as this weekend.”
Halperin said drafts of Biden’s speech have already been written for him to review.
“He will continue on as president; that’s his intention,” Halperin said.
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“He will also not, I’m told, endorse Vice President Harris as his successor. They’re hoping that he will endorse an open process in which the convention will be open to Vice President Harris and a few other candidates,” he said.
“The belief is that Vice President Harris is already looking at potential running mates to go to Chicago with a full ticket, including one possibility, Andy Beshear, the governor of Kentucky, and perhaps the governor of Pennsylvania, Gov. [Josh] Shapiro,” he said.
Democratic Govs. Gavin Newsom of California and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan are also being discussed, he said.
Halperin said the deal being cut would allow an open first ballot at the convention, with Democratic Super Delegates making the selection if no first-ballot winner emerges.
Halperin said the “high-level pressure from Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama and others” was one factor pushing Biden to drop out, as well as information from his aides that he was likely to lose to former President Donald Trump.
According to Axios, Biden had been told by aides that he has no chance.
“The private message, distilled to its bluntest form: The top leaders of his party, his friends and key donors believe he can’t win, can’t change public perceptions of his age and acuity, and can’t deliver congressional majorities,” Axios wrote, saying Biden’s reversal of his pledge to remain in the campaign could come this weekend.
“His choice is to be one of history’s heroes, or to be sure of the fact that there’ll never be a Biden presidential library,” Axios quoted what it said was a friend of Biden’s whose name was not used as saying.
In an excerpt of an interview with BET that was released Wednesday, Biden indicated there might be an exit strategy linked to his health.
“If I had some medical condition that emerged, if somebody, if doctors came to me and said, you got this problem and that problem,” Biden said, according to The New York Times.
