Despite special counsel Robert Hur’s draw-dropping report alleging grave misgivings about President Joe Biden‘s mental acuity, Democratic donors will likely continue their support of the president through the November elections.
Democratic donors are facing the inevitable acknowledgment that Biden, 81, will remain the party’s nominee even as voters remain weary of his ability to govern for another four years in the White House, according to the Wall Street Journal.
There remain few credible options to replace Biden atop the ticket during the party convention later in August, and after defeating former President Donald Trump in 2020, Biden may be the only Democratic who can defeat him again.
Here are the three top reasons donors aren’t jumping ship from the Biden reelection campaign.
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Trump’s vulnerabilities are a boon for Biden
Democratic opposition to another Trump presidency has pushed donors to continue fundraising for Biden.
At a luncheon among eight Democratic donors this month, there remained strong support for Biden due to Trump likely becoming the GOP nominee, according to the Wall Street Journal.
“I don’t care if Joe Biden is a sequel to Weekend at Bernie’s,” one donor said. “If Joe Biden is the nominee, I’m all in because of who he is running against.”
Trump remains a uniquely vulnerable presidential candidate as he battles 91 felony charges stemming from four cases.
The former president has a distinct penchant for making controversial statements that hog the limelight and give fodder for his opponents. In one recent example, Trump suggested Russia could “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries that are not financially up to date during a South Carolina campaign rally.
Trump has also been blamed for costing Republicans key races during the 2018 midterm elections, the 2020 elections, and the 2022 midterm elections. His meddling in Congress helped New York Democrat Tom Suozzi defeat Republican challenger Mazi Pilip to replace disgraced former Rep. George Santos in New York’s 3rd Congressional District.
On Friday, Trump and his associates were ordered to pay roughly $364 million in penalties for committing decades of business fraud through his real estate empire, the Trump Organization. This comes after Trump was ordered to pay writer E. Jean Carroll $83.2 million in a separate defamation case.
Filing deadlines make it unlikely a true Biden challenger will emerge
Even if donors wanted to dump Biden, the filing deadlines would make choosing another Democratic hard to do.
The filing deadlines for at least 30 state primaries have already passed, according to the Federal Election Commission schedule. Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN), a Democratic primary rival to Biden, did not appear on the Nevada primary ballot last week because he launched his presidential campaign after the filing deadline.
Democratic bundler John Morgan claimed it was too late to change course now as several votes will hold primaries on Super Tuesday, March 5.
“I don’t even know what it would look like if he dropped out at this point in time,” Morgan told the Wall Street Journal. “At some point you’ve crossed the Rubicon, burned the boats and that’s that.”
Democrats fear party disunity will harm Biden and Kamala Harris
In private, Democrats fret that an intraparty battle to replace Biden would prove unsuccessful and hurt him in a general election matchup against Trump in November.
Vice President Kamala Harris’s struggles as Biden’s running mate have not endeared her as the inevitable choice to succeed Biden.
Yet, Harris claimed she is “ready to serve” as the leader of the United States. “I am ready to serve. There’s no question about that,” Harris said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal just two days before the Hur report reawakened concern about Biden’s age and mental agility as an 81-year-old leader.
Democratic donors claim Biden remains a top fundraiser as he prepares for another fundraising haul in California next week.
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The Biden reelection is expected to pull in millions of dollars at a New York fundraiser on March 28 with former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.
There has been some fear that a third-party candidate such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. could thwart Biden’s campaign or pull votes from Trump, upending the election. “People are trapped between a rock and a hard place — they don’t like either choice,” said Philip Levine, a former Miami Beach, Fla., mayor and Biden donor in 2020.