U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) speaks at a press conference on Capitol Hill about 11 Senate Democrats who sent a letter to President Joe Biden urging him to invoke the 14th Amendment to avoid a catastrophic debt default, in Washington, May 18, 2023.
Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters
Sen. Bernie Sanders urged Democrats to “stop the bickering” and support President Joe Biden, admonishing those who have been spurred by fears about the incumbent’s health to call for a new nominee to compete against former President Donald Trump.
“Enough!” Sanders, an independent from Vermont who caucuses with Democrats, wrote in a New York Times op-ed published Saturday.
“Mr. Biden may not be the ideal candidate, but he will be the candidate and should be the candidate,” Sanders wrote. “And with an effective campaign that speaks to the needs of working families, he will not only defeat Mr. Trump but beat him badly.”
Sanders, who at 82 is the second-oldest sitting U.S. senator after Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley, also chastised the “corporate media” for “obsessively” focusing on Biden’s cognitive capabilities.
“The media has frantically searched for every living human being who no longer supports the president or any neurologist who wants to appear on TV,” Sanders wrote.
“Unfortunately, too many Democrats have joined that circular firing squad.”
Sanders’ op-ed is the latest attempt to shore up Democratic support for the presidential ticket, which is suffering an unprecedented crisis of confidence following Biden’s disastrous debate against Trump in late June.
Biden, 81, looked stiff and occasionally unfocused in that debate, and the answers he delivered were raspy, sometimes garbled and difficult to follow.
His almost universally panned performance set off panic among Democratic donors and allies alike, as well as lawmakers who are also up for election in November, about whether Biden can effectively challenge Trump.
By NBC News’ tally, 19 congressional Democrats — including Vermont’s other U.S. senator, Peter Welch — have now called on Biden to step aside, a stunning phenomenon less than four months before Election Day.
Some top Democrats, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and current House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York, have recently shared statements that stopped short of unequivocally backing Biden as the party’s nominee.
Biden has refused to withdraw, defending his fitness for the campaign and the presidency even while acknowledging his poor performance in the debate.
And he has also received the explicit backing of some key Democratic groups and allies — among them Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, whose support for Biden in the 2020 election cycle was widely seen as a saving grace for that campaign.
Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist and a former presidential candidate, has repeatedly defended Biden in the wake of the debate, putting aside his disagreements with the Democrat’s policy record.
In Saturday’s op-ed, Sanders noted that he opposed the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s military campaign against Hamas, as well as for the Affordable Care Act as a cure for America’s “broken” health care system.
But “I will do all that I can to see that President Biden is re-elected,” Sanders wrote.
“Why? Despite my disagreements with him on particular issues, he has been the most effective president in the modern history of our country and is the strongest candidate to defeat Donald Trump — a demagogue and pathological liar.”
“Yes. I know: Mr. Biden is old, is prone to gaffes, walks stiffly and had a disastrous debate with Mr. Trump. But this I also know: A presidential election is not an entertainment contest. It does not begin or end with a 90-minute debate,” Sanders wrote.
“Supporters of Mr. Biden can speak proudly about a good and decent Democratic president with a record of real accomplishment,” he wrote.
Sanders pointed to Biden’s efforts to rebuild a U.S. economy upended by the Covid-19 pandemic, his investments in infrastructure and climate change-related projects, and other accomplishments.
And he contrasted Biden with Trump, who Sanders said wants to “cut taxes for the billionaire class” and let corporations “get away with exploiting workers and ripping off consumers.”
“If Mr. Biden and his supporters focus on these issues — and refuse to be divided and distracted — the president will rally working families to his side in the industrial Midwest swing states and elsewhere and win the November election,” Sanders said.
“And let me say this as emphatically as I can: For the sake of our kids and future generations, he must win,” he added.
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