By Takuya Karube,
U.S. President Joe Biden on Sunday abruptly abandoned his reelection bid in the face of growing doubts among his supporters over his age and whether he still has the mental sharpness to defeat his predecessor Donald Trump.
Biden publicly endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic Party's nominee. The 59-year-old would be the first woman to serve as U.S. president if she replaces Biden atop the party's ticket and wins in the November election against Trump, who formally accepted the Republican Party's nomination on Thursday.
"While it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as president for the remainder of my term," Biden said in a statement posted on the X social media platform.
Biden, who has been isolating at his Delaware beach house since being diagnosed with COVID-19 last week, is already the oldest president in U.S. history. His four-year term ends in January next year.
"Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year," Biden said in a subsequent X post, calling on other Democrats "to come together and beat Trump. Let's do this."
Harris, a former senator and state attorney general from California, is the first female, first Black and first Asian American U.S. vice president.
In a statement, Harris said she is "honored" to have Biden's endorsement and "will do everything" in her power to unite Democrats and the country, and defeat Trump.
The 81-year-old Biden's decision came after his shaky debate performance against Trump on June 27 raised questions about the incumbent's fitness to continue his campaign for the Nov. 5 election and serve another four-year term.
In stark contrast to Republicans, who have united behind Trump with particular fervor since he survived an assassination attempt at a rally about a week ago, there was no end in sight to the Democratic infighting in the run-up to Biden's announcement.
Although Biden characterized his poor debate showing as a bad night, caused by factors including jet lag after two overseas trips earlier in June, such explanations did not assuage fears among Democrats about his ability to thwart Trump's bid for a second term.
In the weeks after the debate, Biden pledged repeatedly that he would stay in the race. Pressure to step aside continued to mount, however, as polls indicated a widening of his 78-year-old Republican rival's lead in the wake of their first face-off in the 2024 cycle.
In state primaries and caucuses earlier this year, Biden and Trump each clinched enough delegates to win the presidential nomination of their respective parties.
Biden's withdrawal came a month before his party's national convention in Chicago, at which Democrats need to formally nominate their presidential candidate.
It remains unclear whether anyone else in the party will challenge Harris for the top spot on the ticket, or whom the vice president will pick as her running mate.
No sitting American president has ever withdrawn from a presidential election race this late.
Given that Harris will have access to Biden's campaign coffers, she has a sizeable edge over other possible Democratic contenders. But her popularity ratings were as low as Biden's for a long time prior to his decision to step down and endorse her.
Some recent polls have shown Harris performing slightly better than Biden against Trump nationally and in some battleground states, even though she is still behind him.
According to an average of national polling data by Real Clear Politics, as of last week Trump was leading Biden by 3 percentage points in a hypothetical 2024 rematch.
On Sunday, Harris quickly drew backing from a number of Democrats, including former President Bill Clinton and their 2016 presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
The couple released a joint statement saying they have joined Biden in endorsing her and will "do whatever we can to support her."
But some prominent Democrats, such as former President Barack Obama and former House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi, who reportedly voiced worries in private conversations over the party's fate if Biden did not step aside, stopped short of making any endorsement, although they hailed his leadership since taking office.
Meanwhile, Trump, who offered a rare unifying message in his nomination-acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, seized the moment to slam Biden in a series of posts on his Truth Social platform, calling him "the worst president" in U.S. history.
Trump's campaign team said in a statement Harris is "just as much of joke as Biden is" and will be "even worse for the people of our nation."
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