Four more Democrats in Congress call for Biden to step aside in the 2024 race

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WASHINGTON — Four additional Democrats in Congress told their lawmaker colleagues during a phone call Sunday that they believe President Joe Biden should step aside to allow someone else to be the party’s nominee for president, according to multiple people on the call and familiar with the discussion. The House Democrats who said Biden should drop out of the 2024 race were Reps. Adam Smith of Washington, Jerry Nadler of New York, Mark Takano of California and Joe Morelle of New York. NBC News has reached out to the Biden campaign for comment. The four lawmakers hold top positions on key House committees and bring the number of Democrats in Congress who have called for the president to reconsider his bid for president to nearly a dozen. Smith is the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, with similar positions held by Nadler on the Judiciary Committee, Takano on the Veterans’ Affairs Committee and Morelle on the House Administration Committee. NBC News has reached out to the four lawmakers for comment. The conversation took place during a call convened by House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., on Sunday afternoon. During the call, which lasted over an hour, Biden’s future as the leader of the party was heavily called into question, according to the sources. Each lawmaker was given a chance to speak in order of seniority. Even those who did not explicitly call on Biden to bow out expressed concerns that he is not the strongest candidate to beat former President Donald Trump in November, additional sources said. There was an overwhelming sense among lawmakers that Vice President Kamala Harris would be a better nominee than Biden, and that she would be the obvious choice to replace Biden should he exit the race, the additional sources said. NBC News has reached out to Jeffries’ office for comment. Polling has indicated that concerns over Biden’s age have long been a top issue for voters, but the president’s widely panned debate performance on June 27 prompted conversations among lawmakers and donors about whether he was the best candidate to face Trump, 78, in the fall. Democrats in Congress have expressed their concerns both publicly and privately about Biden’s candidacy. Some House Democrats in battleground districts are weighing whether to distance themselves from Biden. Rep. Susan Wild, D-Pa., expressed concerns Sunday about campaigning with the president, particularly about how Biden being at the top of the ticket could impact down-ballot Democrats like herself, according to two people familiar with her comments. Wild, who narrowly won re-election in 2022 with 51% of the vote, stopped short of calling on Biden to exit the race, these people said. Rep. Angie Craig, D-Minn., went further on Saturday when she became the first front-line Democrat to call for Biden to bow out. “President Biden is a good man & I appreciate his lifetime of service,” she wrote in a post to X. “But I believe he should step aside for the next generation of leadership.” The Congressional Black Caucus is largely behind Biden, two sources told NBC News, with “little cracks” in the group. California Democratic Reps. Maxine Waters and Barbara Lee defended Biden forcefully on Sunday's call, as they have publicly since Biden's debate with Trump last month. Separately, Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., released a statement Sunday afternoon to voice her support for Biden’s candidacy and criticize Democrats calling for him to step aside. Wilson is also a member of the Congressional Black Caucus but was not part of Sunday’s call. “Any ‘leader’ calling for President Biden to drop out needs to get their priorities straight and stop undermining this incredible actual leader who has delivered real results for our country,” Wilson said in her statement. In the days after the debate and his interview with ABC News on Friday, Biden has remained defiant about calls for him to leave the race, reiterating multiple times that he’s staying in. During a stop in the battleground state of Pennsylvania on Sunday, Biden said "yes" after being asked if the Democratic Party was behind him. Biden, 81, sat for an interview on Friday with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos, but it did little to quiet discussions among Democrats on Capitol Hill that he should exit the race. During the interview, Biden dismissed the calls for him to step aside and said only the “Lord Almighty” could get him to reconsider his presidential bid. “Look, I mean, if the Lord Almighty came down and said, ‘Joe, get out of the race,’ I’ll get out of the race,” Biden said during the interview. “The Lord Almighty’s not coming down.”