Biden says he is dropping out of presidential race as Democrats prepare to ‘pass the torch’

President Joe Biden said Sunday that he will drop out of the 2024 presidential race, a stunning decision that came after weeks of pressure for the 81-year-old Democrat to quit the contest against former President Donald Trump.

“It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your President,” Biden wrote in a post on the social media site X.

“And while it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term,” Biden wrote.

“I will speak to the Nation later this week in more detail about my decision.”

The president’s decision blows open the presidential race less than four months before Election Day. It also poses extraordinary questions and challenges for the Democratic party, which now must scramble to assemble a new presidential ticket.

The next candidate will need to compete against the Republican ticket of Trump and Sen. JD Vance, win over donors, delegates and other allies who were loyal to the incumbent — all while convincing voters of their own worthiness for the nation’s highest office.

But a growing number of top Democrats have made clear in recent weeks that they prefer that daunting task to keeping Biden as their nominee.

Biden’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The 81-year-old president started to hemorrhage support from his own party after his catastrophic debate performance against Trump in late June.

While he is only three years older than Trump, Biden looked and sounded significantly worse on the debate stage. He displayed a stiff posture and sometimes vacant-looking gaze, and he frequently gave answers that were raspy, unclear and unimpactful.

In both substance and appearance Biden contrasted sharply with Trump, who looked and sounded the same as he has in recent years.

The debate instantly set off a crisis among Democrats. Even before it ended, party operatives were raising doubts about whether Biden could effectively campaign against Trump.

High-profile Democratic donors and backers openly urged Biden to drop out, with some vowing to withhold campaign contributions in the meantime.

Days after the debate, Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas became the first sitting Democrat in Congress to call on Biden to withdraw from the race. Nearly 20 others soon followed suit, including Sen. Peter Welch of Vermont and Rep. Adam Schiff of California.

Biden and his aides spent weeks trying to stanch the bleeding. In his first post-debate interview, Biden said he was convinced that he is the best person to take on Trump, adding that he could only be persuaded to step down “if the Lord Almighty comes out and tells me that.”

But as his resolute posture failed to quell the unrest in his party, Biden suggested he could be moved to withdraw in other ways.

In a BET interview that aired Wednesday during the Republican National Convention, Biden said he might reconsider his decision to stay in the race “if I had some medical condition that emerged.”

On the same day that interview was set for broadcast, Biden tested positive for Covid-19. He canceled a scheduled appearance in Las Vegas and returned home to Delaware.

Biden is already the oldest person ever to serve in the White House, and he would have been 86 at the end of a second term. He had weathered questions about his physical and mental fitness even during his 2020 run.

Those concerns grew in the 2024 cycle, but they were aggressively batted down by Biden’s campaign and White House aides, and the president’s relative lack of press conferences and interviews may have shielded scrutiny about his acuity.

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