Inside Biden’s withdrawal: ‘I need you and Mike at the house,’ he told 2 top aides
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Still sick and raspy, President Joe Biden opted to announce his decision to withdraw from his re-election campaign by letter rather than on camera.
PHOTO: AFP
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WASHINGTON – “I need you and Mike at the house,” US President Joe Biden said late on July 20 afternoon.
Mr Biden was on the phone from his vacation home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, with Mr Steve Ricchetti, one of his closest advisers. The President was referring to Mr Mike Donilon, his chief strategist. Soon, both men were in Rehoboth Beach, socially distanced from Mr Biden, who was recovering from Covid-19.
From that afternoon and far into the night, the three worked on one of the most important and historic letters of Mr Biden’s presidency – his decision to withdraw from his re-election campaign after top Democrats, donors, close allies and friends had pressured him relentlessly to get out.
He finalised the decision only on July 21 morning and then made separate calls to three people to let them know: Vice-President Kamala Harris; Mr Jeffrey Zients, the White House chief of staff; and Ms Jen O’Malley Dillon, the campaign chair. He would not tell most of his staff until a minute before making his announcement to the world
Mr Biden made his decision, a senior administration official familiar with his thinking said, in part because he had tried for weeks to flip the attention from his listless and at times incoherent debate performance in June
But in the end, the official said, the President “couldn’t get there”.
Mr Biden made what may be the hardest political decision of his career with perhaps the smallest of circles. With him in Rehoboth over the weekend were Mr Ricchetti and two other aides: Ms Annie Tomasini, his deputy chief of staff, and Mr Anthony Bernal, chief of staff to First Lady Jill Biden. Mr Donilon was not at Rehoboth Beach when the call came and had to rush there.
Still sick and raspy, Mr Biden opted to announce his decision by letter rather than on camera, and worked on drafting it with Mr Donilon, the author of many of the President’s public words, while Mr Ricchetti focused on next steps, such as when to inform the staff, how to do it and who else would need to be notified.
At 1.45pm on July 21 – a minute before Mr Biden posted his letter of withdrawal – the President told his most senior White House and campaign advisers on a video call, including Ms Anita Dunn, who manages communications strategy in the West Wing. He read the letter to them and thanked his staff for their service.
“Come to me with the work, and let’s get it done,” the President told them. The posting went online at 1.46pm.
Mr Zients then held a call with other White House officials to confirm that it was true and thank them for all their hard work, followed by a similar call he held with the Cabinet, members of which were not aware until the posting went online. Some Biden advisers were in tears, many in shock but many also relieved.
Mr Biden spent part of the rest of the day making phone calls to congressional leaders and other allies. Announcing the end of his candidacy online gave him the ability to do it “his way”, the official said, avoiding the intrigue and leaks that have plagued his campaign in recent weeks. NYTIMES
