Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi reportedly issued President Joe Biden an ultimatum: step down from the presidential race “the easy way” or face the prospect of her revealing internal campaign polls showing him lagging behind in key states. Politico reported on Monday that Pelosi put her foot down after weeks of public insistence by Biden that he would forge ahead with his campaign despite significant fallout from his disastrous debate performance on June 27th.
Nancy made clear that they could do this the easy way or the hard way,” one anonymous Democrat source familiar with the discussions told the outlet. She gave them three weeks of the easy way. It was about to be the hard way.” The “hard way,” according to Politico, would have involved Pelosi taking previously private efforts she was part of to persuade Biden to withdraw from the race into the public discourse. This reportedly carried the threat of publicizing internal Biden campaign polls conducted last week, which showed him trailing in every battleground state and at risk in other states Democrats rely on during presidential elections, including New Mexico and Virginia.
These damning internal surveys were reportedly presented to the president during a key meeting with two of his advisers, Steve Ricchetti and Mike Donilon, on Saturday. The meeting apparently played a significant role in Biden’s decision announced on Sunday. In addition to presenting new concerns from lawmakers and updates on a fundraising operation that had slowed considerably, they brought forth the campaign’s own polls, which showed his path to victory in November had vanished, according to five people familiar with the matter.
Biden then notified a small group of close aides about his decision to end his bid for another term before posting his historic letter on social media site X. The pressure campaign from Pelosi and others against Biden came after he won every Democrat nominating contest and secured 14 million votes in the primary following the DNC’s assistance in ensuring he faced no serious primary challenge. Now, some 4,600 delegates will decide the nominee for Democrat voters at the convention in August.
Biden followed up his announcement with an endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris to succeed him as the party’s standard-bearer. Harris seems to be the frontrunner for the nomination, quickly consolidating support among party officials and leaders.