20241776 Club
Biden ends his reelection bid; hands the nomination to Harris
Twenty-four days after a debate that alarmed his own party, the president steps aside.
For weeks after his June 27 debate against Donald Trump, Joe Biden had insisted he was staying in the race, even as more than thirty senior Democrats called for him to step down. On July 21, 2024, after advisors Steve Ricchetti and Mike Donilon concluded there was no plausible path to victory, Biden announced he would not seek a second term. He endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris within the hour. She became the Democratic nominee two weeks later, the first eligible incumbent president to withdraw from a re-election bid since Lyndon Johnson in 1968…
