U.S. Representative Lloyd Doggett has become the first Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives to publicly call for President Joe Biden to end his re-election campaign.
“President Biden has continued to run substantially behind Democratic senators in key states and in most polls has trailed Donald Trump. I had hoped that the debate would provide some momentum to change that. It did not,” Doggett said.
“Instead of reassuring voters, the President failed to effectively defend his many accomplishments and expose Trump’s many lies.”
Doggett’s call for President Biden to drop out of the race was not a referendum on his first term. In fact, the House Democrat said “much of [Biden’s] work has been transformational.”
“While much of his work has been transformational, he pledged to be transitional,” Doggett continued.
“He has the opportunity to encourage a new generation of leaders from whom a nominee can be chosen to unite our country through an open, democratic process.”
Despite Doggett’s call for the President to end his campaign, it does not appear Biden has any plans of ending his run anytime soon. Following last week’s presidential debate, Biden campaign spokesperson Seth Schuster said, “Of course he’s not dropping out.”
“Stay the course,” fellow House Democrat Jim Clyburn added in a separate statement.
