George Clooney, an outspoken Democrat and supporter of Joe Biden, is the latest in a line of public figures to call upon the president to drop his re-election bid after a distressing debate performance late last month.
The Academy-Award-winning actor in an opinion piece for the New York Times published on Wednesday argued that the Democratic Party is in desperate need of a new nominee in order to defeat former President Donald Trump in November. Clooney wrote of the “profound moment” the country is currently in, noting how just last month he hosted the “single largest fundraiser supporting any Democratic candidate ever, for President Biden’s re-election.”
“I love Joe Biden,” Clooney wrote. “As a senator. As a vice president and as president. I consider him a friend, and I believe in him. Believe in his character. Believe in his morals. In the last four years, he’s won many of the battles he’s faced.”
“But the one battle he cannot win is the fight against time,” he continued. “None of us can. It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fund-raiser was not the Joe “big F—ing deal” Biden of 2010. He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate.”
Regarding the debate, in which the 81-year-old President stumbled continually, Clooney wrote that “our party leaders need to stop telling us that 51 million people didn’t see what we just saw.”
“We’re all so terrified by the prospect of a second Trump term that we’ve opted to ignore every warning sign. The George Stephanopoulos interview only reinforced what we saw the week before. As Democrats, we collectively hold our breath or turn down the volume whenever we see the president, who we respect, walk off Air Force One or walk back to a mic to answer an unscripted question,” he wrote.
Clooney also claimed that his opinion was widely and quietly shared amongst Democratic lawmakers on Capitol Hill and elsewhere. “This is the opinion of every senator and congress member and governor that I’ve spoken with in private,” he alleged. “Every single one, irrespective of what he or she is saying publicly.”
In favor of the sitting president, potential candidates could be Vice President Kamala Harris, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, amongst others, Clooney suggested.
“Joe Biden is a hero,” the actor concluded. “He saved democracy in 2020. We need him to do it again in 2024.”