Top White House Officials Believe Biden Must Drop Out, CNN Says

CNN reported on Thursday that amid mounting calls for President Joe Biden to end his reelection bid, some of those urging him to step aside are “inside” the White House and close to him.

Network reporter M.J. Lee said she and others at CNN spoke to dozens of people close to the president. She said many now believe the 81-year-old should suspend his campaign so Democrats can find a replacement candidate to face former President Donald Trump in November.

Until Thursday, reports of calls for Biden to move over for another candidate had mostly been isolated to high-ranking party officials and media pundits.

During CNN’s coverage of the fourth and final night of the Republican National Convention, anchor Erin Burnett broke in with a live shot of Lee at the White House, where she said those surrounding Biden are now blowing the whistle.

“Erin, my colleagues and I have spoken with dozens of sources, both inside and close to the White House and the campaign and this much is clear right now, many senior-most officials inside the White House and the Biden campaign privately believe at this point that the president does need to drop out,” Lee reported, adding:

They’ve simply seen the current political situation as being completely untenable. As one senior Democrat put it to us, everyone is saying it privately. People see and feel the walls are closing in. This comes as sources have said that the president has become exceptionally insulated, and isolated in recent days.

Everyone is familiar with the fact that the president has for you here’s relied on a small circle of advisers about what we are seeing, in the picture that has been painted for us since the debate is that that group of the most loyal aides that are really dug in with the president has become stunningly small – chief among them, of course, Mike Donilon and Steve Ricchetti – both of whom have of course worked with the president for a number of decades and know him really well.

Lee further reported that people who had been regularly meeting with Biden to deliver him “bad news” following his disastrous debate performance last month against Trump stopped coming.

She concluded, “I think all of this just serves as a reminder that very few people actually have an insight into the president’s mind right now, Erin.”

Watch above via CNN.