“The last time Joe Biden lost the New York Times editorial board’s endorsement it turned out pretty well for him,” Biden campaign co-chair Cedric L Richmond said in a statement.
The editorial board passed over Biden in the 2020 primary to endorse two of his competitors, Senators Amy Klobuchar (Minnesota) and Elizabeth Warren (Massachusetts). The editorial board did end up endorsing him in the general election against Trump.
It is not too late for Democrats to replace Biden on the ticket, though it would probably depend on him first agreeing to step aside. He has given no indication publicly that he is thinking about that.
Biden sought to quell concerns about his candidacy during a post-debate rally in North Carolina. Biden, 81, told supporters in Raleigh he knows he is “not a young man, to state the obvious”.
“I don’t debate as well as I used to, but I know what I do know: I know how to tell the truth,” Biden said. “I know right from wrong. And I know how to do this job.”
A Biden campaign spokesperson, Michael Tyler, also dismissed the idea that the president would consider stepping aside.
“There are no conversations about that whatsoever,” Tyler told reporters on Air Force One. “The Democratic voters … nominated Joe Biden. Joe Biden’s the nominee.”
In its piece, The Washington Post’s editorial board wrote that Biden’s debate performance “raises legitimate questions about whether he’s up for another four years in the world’s toughest job” but didn’t explicitly call on him to step aside.
Post columnist David Ignatius, however, wrote that it was “obvious nearly a year ago that President Biden shouldn’t run for a second term”. In September, Ignatius had called on Biden to opt against seeking reelection.
