Crucial family summit at Camp David for Joe Biden. What had long been planned as a happy occasion for a group photo of the clan and a carefree weekend with children and grandchildren in the presidential country residence in view of the independence day of July 4, has turned into a difficult moment of discussion and reflection on his future after the debacle in the TV duel with Donald Trump.
Despite his declared intention not to throw in the towel and the renewed support of Democratic leaders, the commander in chief must deal with growing external and internal pressure: the numerous appeals from authoritative media for his withdrawal, the fears (so far mostly expressed privately) of a segment of the party of losing not only the White House but also Congress, the doubts of many donors – from Hollywood to Silicon Valley – even if so far no one has turned off the taps (over 27 million dollars raised between the day of the debate and Friday evening). Time is running out, there are less than two months to go until the convention in Chicago and on July 9 Biden does not want to appear as a lame duck in front of European leaders for the NATO summit in Washington, where all eyes and cameras will once again be on him, ready to scrutinize his every misstep.
The fate of the president – and of the country – will be decided by what Axios defines as the White House oligarchy, namely his wife Jill, his younger sister Valerie and the 85-year-old Ted Kaufman, a lifelong friend and advisor. as well as a small group of trusted West Wing advisors. Almost a family affair, where the most influential voice is that of the first lady, so far deaf to any criticism: “Joe is not only the right person for this job, but he is the only person for this job”, she repeated in the collections funds in Ny. It is not excluded that, in private, old Joe also consults two former Democratic president friends, Obama and Clinton. Biden, according to sources close to him cited by NBC, was described as humiliated, disheartened and painfully aware that the images of him at the debate will survive beyond his presidency, along with a failing performance. The situation “is a disaster,” one of the sources said.
In light of the Atlanta shock, three schools of thought have emerged within the Donkey Party: those who will defend Biden under any circumstances, those who are ready to dump him, and those who are waiting to see what he will do – and what the poll numbers will be in the coming days – before making a judgment. It is the third segment that Dem insiders are closely monitoring.
Donors have also split into three camps: the first believes that pushing for Biden to withdraw is a self-destructive failure from the start; the second (including the two most active Dem fundraisers in Hollywood, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Haim Saban) is a wait-and-see and wants party leaders to consider drastic measures only after having better examined the fallout from the debate; the third is an immediate change without wasting time. Biden must also consider whether abandoning the race is worse than continuing it. This is what his campaign fears, as revealed in a leaked memo: “A withdrawal would lead to weeks of chaos, pies in the face and a lot of candidates struggling in a brutal battle on the convention stage, all this while Donald Trump has time to speak to American voters unchallenged.” As he did in the debate, where he fired off about thirty lies.
Meanwhile, the tycoon awaits on Monday – the same day on which his former White House strategist Steve Bannon will enter prison for contempt of Congress – the supreme court’s ruling on presidential immunity as a shield in the trials for the assault on the Capitol, the papers Mar-a-Lago dungeons and the attempted overturning of the vote in Georgia. Whatever the decision, which comes after five months, the conservative majority court has already helped him avoid any hearing before Election Day on November 5th. The unknown remains of having to challenge a rival other than Biden, if the Dems will replace him with a “younger, more energetic and experienced” candidate, as the former Republican challenger Nikky Haley warned, almost nominating herself to be his deputy.
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