Source: CNN
Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Finance Committee, confirmed on Friday that then-Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer privately urged President Joe Biden to abandon his 2024 campaign in July, shortly after his disastrous CNN debate performance.
“First of all, Chuck Schumer and Joe Biden have a long relationship. Chuck was a credible and persuasive connection because they go back to the years working on Judiciary Committee issues,” Wyden told CNN’s Kasie Hunt. “That was a real common bond for them, so I think that was the right move for Senate Democrats to reach out through Senator Schumer.”
His comments corroborate details from a new piece published Friday by The New York Times. Schumer, according to The Times, told Biden on July 13, 2024, “If you run and you lose to Trump, and we lose the Senate, and we don’t get back the House, that 50 years of amazing, beautiful work goes out the window.’”
The Senate majority leader, the outlet reported, also told the president, “If I were you, I wouldn’t run, and I’m urging you not to run.’”
While the new reporting shows Schumer’s influence in private, he publicly praised Biden in July following his announcement he would leave the race, saying in a statement at the time, “His decision of course was not easy, but he once again put his country, his party, and our future first.”
Wyden acknowledged on “CNN This Morning” that he and his Democratic colleagues were “generally” aware and supportive of the meeting between Schumer and Biden.
“Certainly, Senator Schumer talks to all of us. The big joke is he knows all of our phone numbers by heart. So yes, there was no question that he was going to do this. He was the person to do it. Those years of working together … made him a good fit for it,” the senator said.
Pressed about whether he was supportive of the effort, Wyden responded, “Yes.”
The longtime Oregon Democrat noted that “obviously, it would have been better if he (Biden) had made the judgment” not to run earlier than he ultimately did.
In private, top Democrats privately pleaded for Biden to leave the race as polling showed the perilous and potentially insurmountable path the president faced at the time in the general election matchup with Donald Trump.
CNN previously reported in July that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi privately told Biden that polling showed he could not defeat Trump and that he could destroy Democrats’ chances of winning the House in the November election. ABC News also reported at the time that Schumer told Biden in a meeting that it would be best if he bowed out of the presidential race.