Joe Biden has announced he will exit the 2024 race for the White House
The 81-year-old incumbent made his decision public on social media
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) July 21, 2024
Expected in Biden’s decision and announcement came after weeks of revolt among party donors, supporters and congressional members that the president’s electoral chances were dimming following a disastrous debate performance that raised new concerns about his age.
Vice President Kamala Harris is the heir apparent for the ticket, but it will be up to Democratic delegates to decide whether she should be the party nominee. The Democratic National Convention is Aug. 19-22, but the party wants to have a virtual roll call before then because of concerns that the Democratic ticket would miss ballot deadlines or face legal challenges.
Harris, 59, the first woman vice president, also would be the first woman president is elected in November.
This week, as Biden was sidelined with Covid, it was Harris who was tasked with making the campaign’s case. She emphasized her former role as a prosecutor, a contrast to Trump, now a convicted felon.
The daughter of Indian and Jamaican immigrants, Harris’ rise was relatively quick, with parallels to that of Barack Obama, another biracial candidate that mirrors the increasing diversity of the American populous. Even when Obama was first running for president, in 2008, and Harris was district attorney of San Francisco, she was seen as an up-and-coming future leader in the party. Two years later, Harris narrowly won a race for state Attorney General and, in 2016, handily defeated a fellow Democrat for an open California seat in the U.S. Senate.
Two years after going to Washington, Harris launched a presidential bid, in a campaign that was initially a splashy debut in her hometown of the Bay Area. She had a standout moment at one of the first Democratic primary debates, when she criticized fellow candidate Biden for his past opposition to school busing. “There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools. And she was bused to school every day. And that little girl was me,” she said, as Biden looked on. He then sternly defended his civil rights record.
Harris also was a favorite among Hollywood donors, and the ties to the industry extended to her husband, Doug Emhoff, an entertainment lawyer from Los Angeles.
Even though that was a signature moment of the primary campaign, Harris’ bid began to falter by the fall, amid staff discord, and she dropped out in December, before the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucus.
By the summer of 2020, with the country in the midst of the Covid pandemic and a racial reckoning following the death of George Floyd, Biden, who already had said he would pick a woman as a running mate, zeroed in on Harris, along with other prominent figures including Elizabeth Warren, Gretchen Whitmer and Susan Rice. He ultimately chose Harris, 22 years younger, even though she had her share of detractors from her home state.Accoridng to The New York Times, Harris won over other contenders because of her skills as a debater, her qualifications and her racial diversity.
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