Democrats rage against Biden’s ‘arrogance’ after Harris loss
Democrats are directing their rage over losing the presidential race at Joe Biden, who they blame for setting up Kamala Harris for failure by not dropping out sooner.
They say his advancing age, questions over his mental acuity and deep unpopularity put Democrats at a sharp disadvantage. They are livid that they were forced to embrace a candidate who voters had made clear they did not want — and then stayed in the race long after it was clear he couldn’t win.
“He shouldn’t have run,” said Jim Manley, a top aide to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “This is no time to pull punches or be concerned about anyone’s feelings. He and his staff have done an enormous amount of damage to this country.”
According to interviews with nearly a dozen officials and party operatives, Biden squandered valuable months only to end in disaster on the debate stage. And by the time he decided to pass the torch, he had saddled Harris with too many challenges and far too little time to build a winning case for herself.
The fresh anger at Biden came as Democrats devolved into a round of recriminations following Tuesday’s decisive loss to Donald Trump, with officials struggling to explain why a majority of the electorate voted Republican for the first time in 20 years.
Democratic leaders had hoped Harris could separate herself from Biden’s deficiencies after taking over the nomination with just 107 days to the election. The candidate switch in July generated a fresh surge of enthusiasm with voters and appeared to instantly reset the race, bolstering the theory that she could eke out a win against an opponent as divisive as Trump.
But any gains Harris made during her abridged campaign were swamped on Tuesday by the enduring backlash against the Biden administration over inflation and cost-of-living concerns — and a president who proved incapable of selling the electorate on his accomplishments and whose apparent overconfidence kept him in the campaign despite growing signs that he wasn’t up for the job. [Continue reading…]