Netflix cofounder Reed Hastings, one of the largest Democratic donors, has called on President Joe Biden to step down from his campaign to give another candidate a shot to beat former President Donald Trump, The New York Times reported.
“Biden needs to step aside to allow a vigorous Democratic leader to beat Trump and keep us safe and prosperous,” Hastings said in an email to the Times.
A spokesperson for Netflix did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. Hastings did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
While he’s the first to call for Biden to step aside, he’s not the first big Democratic donor from Hollywood to express concern.
Ari Emmanuel, CEO of Endeavor, expressed frustration at a recent talk with Tina Brown at the Aspen Ideas Festival about the ability of a president as old as Biden, who is 81, to run for president. Trump is 78.
“Well, I’m pissed off at the Founding Fathers. They had the start date of 35. They just didn’t give us the end date,” he said.
Hollywood supporters have been important to the Biden campaign. The Biden campaign said it raised more than $30 million at a star-studded Los Angeles fundraiser in June which was spearheaded by former President Barack Obama, George Clooney, and Julia Roberts. It’s unclear if more Hollywood donors will follow Hastings and call for Biden to step aside.
Hastings is one of the first to publicly express the private concerns of some major Democratic donors since Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Trump on June 27, during which the president stumbled on his words and, at times, struggled to complete his thoughts.
Multiple donors who remained anonymous told The Washington Post that Biden’s debate performance reflected his interactions in small group settings at donor events, telling the newspaper that the president struggled to communicate.
One unnamed business executive who helped organize a fundraiser last year in Chicago told the Post he was shocked when Biden’s team refused to let donors ask the president questions.
“I told them my donors don’t care about a photo. They want to talk to him. The Biden people just wouldn’t let them,” the business executive told the Post. “It was clear they were managing him in a way I’ve never experienced before. Donors expect to get to talk to the president if you’re writing a big check and having an event with him.”
Biden’s campaign team has been undertaking major damage control to convince donors and voters that the president is still fit for the job.
On Tuesday, the campaign flouted a $127 million windfall in June, including $38 million within four days of Biden’s debate against Trump.
In an email to BI, a spokesperson for the Biden campaign highlighted statements reported by various outlets coming from those inside the administration, including Vice President Kamala Harris and Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, that emphasized Biden’s commitment to the race.
“We will not back down. We will follow our president’s lead. We will fight, and we will win,” Harris told Biden’s campaign staff in a call, according to The Times.
Not every donor agrees with Hastings. Noah Mamet, a former abassador to Argentina during the second Obama administration and a major donor to Biden’s campaign, told BI in a text message that he maintains steadfast support for the president and described the attacks against Biden as “self-destructive.”
“President Biden has reinforced he’s running for reelection. He knows the stakes. He knows the existential threat that Trump is to the country,” Mamet wrote. “Until he says he’s not the candidate, we Democrats need to rally around him and work even harder to make sure we win, keep Trump out, and continue to have a democracy after November.”
He pointed to a recent Supreme Court decision that gave the US president the presumption of immunity on “official” actions as an example of what’s at stake in this year’s election.
Still, some major donors remain unconvinced that Biden is the best nominee.
In phone conversations with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, multiple top Democratic party donors have urged for Biden to step aside for another candidate, people familiar with the call told the Post, according to the Wednesday report.
Hastings has been a major supporter of the Democratic Party in recent years, donating millions to the party during the Trump era.
According to The Times, he and his wife, Patty Quillin, have donated more than $20 million to the party in the last few years.
The couple donated at least $1.5 million to support Biden during the 2020 race and $100,000 last year for the 2024 campaign, The Times reported.
A Biden campaign spokesperson did not address Hastings’s public call in their statement to BI.
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