Jan. 6 committee members leverage Trump in pleas for Biden to step aside

Democrats who played prominent roles on the House Jan. 6 committee — which concluded that Donald Trump poses a unique danger to democracy — are at the forefront of the latest push by members of Congress to call on President Joe Biden to consider dropping his reelection bid.

It’s an effort driven by their fears of a resurgent Trump.

On consecutive days this week, Reps. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) — three of the Jan. 6 panel’s seven Democrats — urged Biden to reconsider his candidacy in light of the party’s eroding confidence in his ability to stave off another Trump presidency. Their statements echoed their assessment of Trump drawn from their work on the select committee.

“As a member of the [Jan. 6 committee], I know, perhaps as well as anyone, how unsuitable Donald Trump is to be president,” Lofgren wrote in a letter to Biden made public Friday. “He remains as grave a threat to the Constitutional order and rule of law as he was on January 6, 2021.”

Still, the growing outcry among those who investigated Trump’s effort to subvert the election carries more a different weight than the rank-and-file calls for Biden to step aside.

Lofgren, in an appearance on MSNBC shortly after she released her letter, added: “I think it’s telling that members of the January 6 committee — myself, Adam Schiff [and] Jamie Raskin — have all suggested that he step aside and that we get another candidate who can beat Donald Trump. Donald Trump is a threat to America. ...He must not be elected.”

Not only are all three members top allies of former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who last week told Biden that some Democrats’ grumbling would grow louder , they spent 18 months amassing evidence and attempting to convince the public of the danger Trump posed if he were again in a position of power. The select committee deposed hundreds of witnesses and held widely watched public hearings that portrayed Trump as the leader of a sprawling effort to upend the transfer of power — who then fomented violence at the Capitol when his other efforts failed.

“It’s really time for the party to nominate a new leader to carry on the torch as we move forward in this battle that is consequential for the future of this country,” said former Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), another member of the Jan. 6 committee, in a phone interview. “The fact that Adam Schiff is coming out to say this — I worked with him on the Jan. 6 committee — I know he’s saying this because he’s genuinely concerned about the threat of Trump to rule of law.”

While she hasn’t personally spoken to her former colleagues, Murphy emphasized that Schiff, Lofgren and Raskin are all in safe Democratic seats, so their decision to speak out wasn’t rooted in their own personal political concerns like many other battleground members.

“I’m well aware that nobody can make this decision but Joe Biden himself,” Murphy said. “But I’m hoping that the patriot in him — and the long-time politician who knows how to read polls — and the person who cares about the future of this country makes the right choice in this moment.”

Despite the growing number of Jan. 6 committee members calling on Biden to consider dropping out, two key members of the panel have not taken that step. The committee’s former chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), has remained firmly in Biden’s camp.

“[R]egardless of who calls on the President to withdraw, as long as the majority of us continue to support Biden, we will win this in November!” Thompson wrote Wednesday on X , a post he has left pinned on his account. “Stay focused, my fellow Democrats.”

Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), a member of House leadership, has previously expressed support for Biden but has been silent on Biden’s fate in recent days.

The Biden campaign has repeatedly insisted the incumbent will not step aside.

“While the majority of the caucus and the diverse base of the party continues to stand with the president and his historic record of delivering for their communities, we’re clear-eyed that the urgency and stakes of beating Donald Trump means others feel differently,” Mia Ehrenberg, a spokesperson for the Biden campaign, said in a statement. The campaign has also emphasized that Biden has retained strong support from the Congressional Black Caucus — of which Thompson is a member — and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

“They spent months immersed in the evidence of Trump’s scheme to overturn the election and fully understand that he considers himself and his allies above the law,” said a person who worked closely with members of the select committee and requested anonymity to speak candidly about the evolving conversations. “These members have also been singled out for retribution in a second Trump term. They wouldn’t have taken these actions lightly, but no one knows better what’s at stake this fall.”

Schiff, who also led the first effort to impeach Donald Trump in 2019 after Trump pressed Ukraine to investigate his political adversaries, ignited this week’s trend Wednesday when he issued a statement saying “a second Trump presidency will undermine the very foundation of our democracy.”

News of Raskin’s call for Biden to rethink his candidacy emerged Thursday, when a July 6 letter he sent to the president , obtained by POLITICO, began to surface publicly. Raskin stopped short of actually calling Biden to drop out — but stressed that there was no shame in doing so given the high stakes of the November election.

“We have an overriding obligation to defeat the forces of resurgent monarchy and oppression,” Raskin wrote.