WASHINGTON — As a growing number of Democrats call for President Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 presidential race, members of the Congressional Black Caucus, a key allied group in Congress, while largely supportive of the president, worry that the continued pressure could be fatal to his campaign and damage the party as a whole.
In interviews with NBC News on Thursday, five members of the caucus said that despite small rifts, most lawmakers remain loyal to Biden. But they still want changes in strategy and staffing to position Democrats to win the November election, and have expressed their concerns to the campaign for months.
Two of the CBC members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share their thoughts about Biden, also said they were concerned Biden might not be able to continue as the nominee unless he can move on from his dismal performance in the debates over the next few days and convince party leaders, donors and voters that he is still the best candidate to beat former President Donald Trump.
“I’m loyal to Biden, there’s no question about that,” said Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Democrat from Missouri. “As it stands, I want him to win. But if he says, ‘I’ve listened to you guys, I’ve listened to you guys, and I don’t want to go any further,’ then I’m OK with someone winning. I think everybody, all of us, is obsessed with winning, because if we’re not there, it’s too serious.”
Asked whether Biden could weather the crisis, Cleaver paused and simply said, “I don’t know.”
Two members of the Congressional Black Caucus, speaking on condition of anonymity, agreed that a majority of the group supports the president but said Biden’s position at the top of the shortlist and as the favorite to beat Trump will weaken as time goes on.
Cleaver said he hopes to see a major shift in the debate over Biden’s status as the Democratic nominee by the end of the Republican National Convention next week and that he is hopeful that Democratic leadership and Biden can find a way forward.
Cleaver said CBC members are keenly aware that things are not going well for the Biden campaign. “We don’t have any mentally ill people at CBC. Anyone who would say, ‘Oh, this is great. Everything is fine,’ would have to be mentally ill,” Cleaver said. “We’re going to try and lock them away somewhere.”
During an appearance on NBC’s “Today” show on Friday, Rep. Jim Clyburn, one of Biden’s key allies in Congress, reiterated his support for the president and declared that the internal debate over Biden’s candidacy needed to end immediately.
“I took Biden at his word that he’s going to continue the campaign, so I’m fully committed,” Clyburn said. “Whatever direction he goes, whatever steps he takes, I’m going to support Biden. I stand with Joe Biden.”
But Clyburn also left open the possibility that Vice President Kamala Harris could take the lead on the nomination if Biden were to withdraw. “If he changes his mind, I have the vice president’s full support,” Clyburn said.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the highest-ranking Black member of Congress and an vocal supporter of Biden, has been listening to comments from Democratic lawmakers all week. In a letter to colleagues, Jeffries acknowledged that he spoke with Biden on Thursday night and “shared directly with him the extensive insights, heartfelt views and conclusions regarding the way forward that our caucus shared in our recent meeting.”
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), a CBC executive who led the select committee that investigated Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 attack, downplayed talk of significant rifts in support for Biden among CBC members. But he, too, acknowledged that some in the group were growing frustrated after days of calls for Biden to resign. Of the group’s 60 members, only one or two have publicly criticized Biden, Thompson said.
“It may be a scratch, but I don’t think it’s a crack,” Thompson said.
Those concerns were echoed in several comments by Rep. Ritchie Torres of New York, who stopped short of calling for Biden to resign but strongly suggested the party should reconsider its nominee.
“The president didn’t just have one ‘bad debate,'” Torres wrote to X. “The reality we have seen with our own eyes is evidence of a much deeper challenge. … If the president officially becomes the Democratic nominee, we will have no choice but to make the best of a complex situation. But there’s no point in denying the complexity.”
A CBC member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he thought Biden’s ability to serve another four years as president was “in doubt” and that his health had seriously deteriorated. But the Democrat said he hoped Biden would stay in the race, win reelection and then step down, allowing Harris to become the first Black woman to become president.
(Meanwhile, Harris maintains her loyalty to Biden remains strong, and has been one of his most staunch defenders, calling dozens of party leaders, civil rights activists and donors to reassure them that Biden can forge ahead despite calls for him to withdraw.)
Among the Democrats who have publicly called on Biden to step down, not a single member of the Congressional Black Caucus is a member.
Earlier this week, CBC Chairman Steven Horsford (D-Nev.) reaffirmed his support for Biden, a move seen as especially significant as Horsford faces a tough election campaign this fall. Still, Horsford said Thursday that the CBC is “not a monolith” and that its members, like the House Democratic caucus as a whole, have “the right to express their views.”
Horford added that he and other members of his caucus have been telling Biden and his campaign “not just over the last few weeks, but over the last few months” that “we need to make fundamental changes in order to win.”
“That change needs to be focused on structural change, strategic change and spending change,” Horsford said.
Another CBC member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations, said Black lawmakers have been stressing to the Biden campaign for months that they need to spend more resources talking about issues close to home like wages, housing costs and inflation, and less time on topics like Trump’s threats to democracy and abortion restrictions in the wake of the overturning of Roe v. Wade. The lawmaker said the state of American democracy and abortion are important, but they’re not topics that most voters worry about in their daily lives.
Thompson echoed Horsford’s calls for a campaign revamp, suggesting Biden is too insular with his inner circle and needs to listen to a wider range of advisers. “Biden needs to put a few more chairs at the campaign table so he can get a broader understanding of what people are really saying,” Thompson said.
Asked if he thought people of color were adequately represented in Biden’s inner circle, Thompson replied: “No. I understand loyalty, and he has people who have been with him for a long time, but that’s not diversity.”
Former Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-Louisiana), who served as chairman of the CBC while in Congress, is co-chairing Biden’s campaign, while Julie Chavez Rodriguez, granddaughter of labor leader Cesar Chavez, is campaign manager. Thompson said he would like to see more people of color represented on Biden’s team.
“It’s a big country. A lot has changed from when he started to now, and we have to build our team to reflect that,” Thompson said. “We’re going to maintain the team but also grow it. I think we’ll add some guys. … Cedric Richmond is good, but he’s a person.”
