Tears and Secrecy: Behind the Scenes of Biden’s Decision to Withdraw
Joe Biden had all but made the decision to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race by Saturday night—but the vast majority of his staff were not told until the literal last minute, reports said.
The president announced to the world that he was dropping his re-election bid at 1:46 p.m. on Sunday, posting a letter in lieu of a video statement that might have run the risk of immortalizing him as “sick and raspy”—lingering symptoms from a bout of COVID-19, according to The New York Times.
That morning, according to the Times, he’d called three people in his inner circle to let them know what was about to go down: Vice President Kamala Harris, White House chief of staff Jeff Zients, and campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon.