‘It's over’: Democrats remain in panic over Biden's reelection

As President Joe Biden’s support continues to crumble, his party is reckoning with the possibility of a punishing defeat in November — a potential GOP wave that would not only elect former President Donald Trump but also sweep away Democrats from power in Congress.

Their angst about Biden prompted one vulnerable member of Congress, Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.), to ask the president directly on Friday to consider dropping out — a stunning confrontation that has deeply rattled Democrats who were already anxious about the high stakes of the moment. Biden’s response, according to a member on the call: I’m running.

And there’s a newfound urgency. Democrats are realizing that Biden’s path to victory is narrowing. His chances in critical Sun Belt states like Arizona and Nevada are dwindling, some Rust Belt states are at risk and blue safe zones like New Hampshire are suddenly in play.

Some big donors are threatening to withhold millions of dollars in pledges to pressure Biden to step aside , and rewarding lawmakers who urge the president to let someone else take his place.

All these forces are fueling a panic within the party that Biden’s meltdown could catapult Republicans into a trifecta in Washington. Some worry that Biden could drag down the rest of the ticket so badly that they not only fail to win back the House, but Trump and Hill Republicans could be handed big-enough majorities in both chambers to actually carry out huge GOP priorities.

“They are nervous about the upcoming election,” Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) said of his Democratic colleagues who are calling for Biden to step down from the ticket. “If anybody tells you they're not, they’re lying.”

The anxieties about being tied to Biden — who polls show has lagged behind Trump in key battlegrounds for months, but has slipped even more recently — permeate the entire ticket. Democrats’ quest to assert more local control may be compromised as well, as Biden’s crisis could jeopardize their attempts to flip legislative chambers in swing states like Arizona and Pennsylvania, and hang onto Michigan and Minnesota.

"If this were any other Democratic candidate, we could talk about how terrible the 34-count convicted felon is, but we're in this discussion about Biden's age,” said one Michigan state lawmaker granted anonymity to speak freely.

More than two dozen lawmakers, Hill staffers, state officials and Democratic operatives were interviewed for this article. Most were granted anonymity to freely discuss the situation or weren’t authorized to speak publicly.

Inside the Capitol, Democrats who fear Biden can’t win make up a majority of the party and a growing number are willing to say so publicly.

"It’s over," one aide to a battleground Democrat said of the fight to flip the House. "It doesn't matter if they're outperforming him by 35 fucking points. The math doesn’t work."

And among those Democrats — especially in the House — there is a growing dread that the political gravity has shifted enormously in the last week. On Monday, Biden’s campaign had temporarily quieted his defectors . But by Friday, many senior Democrats privately believed a push to remove the president at the highest levels was inevitable, even after he held a nearly hourlong press conference after the NATO summit Thursday specifically to calm detractors.

No one will say out loud that the upper rungs of House leadership want Biden to drop his bid. But lawmakers and senior aides say the two people who could bring an end to the hand wringing — Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi — have conspicuously chosen not to. In private conversations with some fellow Democrats, Pelosi has suggested she wants him to step aside, according to two people familiar with the discussions.

Privately, Democratic leaders know the longer this goes, the worse it is for the party. Jeffries’ team had encouraged lawmakers that if they planned to speak, do it sooner than later, according to three people familiar with the discussions — hoping to avoid a drip-drip of member comments in the coming weeks.

Jeffries released no details from his one-on-one with Biden on Thursday night. Those parsing his letter afterwards, though, said they believed he did “deliver the bad news,” according to one Democrat.

A spokesperson for Jeffries declined to comment on a private meeting.

Democrats, taking stock of Biden’s extremely narrow path to victory, are beginning to believe that their personal political interests are being jeopardized along with the president’s.

“I think the map is a lot more narrow than it was,” said a Democratic strategist. “Obviously anything is possible, and there are a lot of weeks ahead of us. But we have to be perfect, and we cannot afford to make mistakes, and I don’t think that’s what we’re seeing right now.”

Biden is still certain to win blue California’s electoral votes. But Democratic lawmakers, senior aides and consultants fear his struggles could endanger incumbents who might otherwise be safe and dangerously narrow offensive opportunities — costing them control of the House.

“I don’t think there’s any coming back from the debate,” said a Democratic consultant who’s working on multiple battleground races, including in California. “There’s nothing that can be done to repair that.”

One group of former House Democrats is so concerned about Biden’s drag down ballot that they penned a letter to Biden calling for an “open convention” to salvage the party’s chances in November.

Part of the problem: Biden is polling far behind his 2020 vote share in scores of competitive House districts. Internal surveys from May and June show him losing districts in New York and California that he carried by double-digit margins four years ago.

That has left key Democratic candidates in the “infuriating” position of “watching the dam,” the consultant said: grimly aware that Biden’s woes could sink them, hoping for a change, but unable to speak up for fear of antagonizing the White House.

The panic among California Democrats is not rooted in post-debate poll drop-offs but a fear that there's only so much altitude they can maintain if Biden tanks at the top of the ticket.

Democratic incumbents in the toughest seats could still hold on, if they can keep running far ahead of Biden and raising enormous amounts of cash. Democratic polling conducted in June for an outside group showed that incumbent Democrats in endangered seats were running an average of 9 points ahead of Biden in their districts, according to a person with direct knowledge of the polling.

"If Biden remains the nominee and shows real weakness, can you have this massive split ticket?" one strategist said. "It's not the current polling data [that's the problem], it's projecting out."

Some Democrats are now saying openly that they believe Trump will win the election so that they can position themselves as a check on his power. Among them are Reps. Jared Golden (D-Maine) and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.), who hold districts that Trump won in 2020.

Party operatives have begun to seriously consider a broader shift toward this message to address voters' anxieties about a Trump win.

"There's going to be a big pivot to 'we need to be a check on Trump,'" a strategist said.

New York state could play a crucial role in control of the House, with as many as seven swing seats. The support for Biden among Democrats running in those seats is eroding, but hasn’t broken. So far, just Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.), representing a seat in the Hudson Valley, has explicitly called on Biden to step aside and not run in November. But he avoided discussing the president’s possible drag down ballot in his argument.

Others Democrats expressed concerns, like Josh Riley, who is challenging Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-N.Y.) for an upstate seat, and told POLITICO that voters “are not wrong” for wishing they had different options in the presidential race. And Laura Gillen, taking on Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.) on Long Island, declined to defend Biden in an interview with POLITICO last week , pivoting to the importance of Democrats keeping the House, even if Trump wins. The top of the ticket is just one factor for House candidates, but some fear that in a close race, it could be the deciding one.

Four years ago, Biden was a desired nominee in part because of his vast appeal to wide swaths of voters, from suburban women in the Midwest to Black voters in the South. But now, he has suddenly become radioactive.

Democrats are spending a record amount of money in state legislative races this cycle in an attempt to claw back power from the GOP — and there’s some concern that Biden’s unpopularity could scramble those efforts.

That fear is prompting some state legislative candidates in battlegrounds to distance themselves from Biden, pressing upon voters the idea that state lawmakers stand to have a greater impact on their daily lives than politicians in Washington.

"Do we wish that the polling was really clear at the very top of the ticket, and Biden was 10 points ahead?’” said one Michigan state lawmaker granted anonymity to speak candidly. “Of course, but there's never a world where we don't run scared and work as if we don't need every single last vote."

Nicholas Wu, Myah Ward and Melanie Mason contributed to this report.