Closing summary
Hello US politics blog readers, it’s been another news-packed day and it will continue that way it seems. We are closing this particular blog now and you can immediately switch to our newly-launched blog focusing on the Republican national convention’s grand finale.
That blog will bring other major news, too, such as any major further developments concerning Joe Biden, the White House, the Democratic party and the 2024 election. You can follow that here. Tonight, Donald Trump is due to accept the Republican party’s official nomination for president and deliver his first speech since the assassination attempt against him last Saturday. So do stick around for all the political news as it happens.
Here’s where things stand:
Joe Biden has begun to accept the idea that he may not be able to win the 5 November presidential election and may have to drop out of the race, the New York Times just reported, citing several people close to the president.
Jamie Raskin, the high-profile Democratic US representative from Maryland, has just increased pressure on Biden to consider whether he should remain at the top of the Democratic ticket for re-election this November, by reportedly sending a letter praising his presidency but asking him to listen to his congressional cohort and making comparisons with a star baseball player who’s too tired to ensure his team wins.
Biden is “soul searching” and taking calls to step aside as the Democratic presidential candidate seriously and multiple Democratic officials think an exit is a matter of time, according to sources familiar with the matter, Reuters reported.
March for Our Lives, the student-led gun control organization, has issued a statement condemning Donald Trump over his lax gun policies ahead of his address tonight. In a statement issued on Thursday, the organization, which emerged from the 2017 Parkland high school shooting in Florida where 17 people were killed, said: “It’s simple: Trump can’t just call for ‘unity’ only when it serves him and only after he’s targeted by the kind of violence he’s repeatedly incited.”
Chris LaCivita, co-campaign manager and senior strategist for Donald Trump, has accused Democrats of staging a “coup” against Joe Biden. LaCivita was responding to reports that senior Democrats are pressuring the 81-year-old to exit the US presidential race as opinion polls show the party facing a wipeout in the White House, House and Senate. “This is nothing more than an attempted coup by the Democratic party,” LaCivita told a CNN-Politico Grill event on the sidelines of the RNC.
Biden is “still experiencing mild upper respiratory symptoms associated with his recent Covid-19 infection”, according to his physician. Kevin C O’Connor, in a letter addressed to the White House’s press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, wrote that the president “continues to receive Paxlovid”.
A spokesperson for the former House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, did not deny that she shared data with Joe Biden during a recent conversation that showed he could not win if he chose to carry on. According to CNN, Pelosi told Biden that polls show he cannot beat Donald Trump and that he could wreck the Democrats’ chances of recapturing the chamber in November. “Speaker Pelosi respects the confidentiality of her meetings and conversations with the president of the United States,” the spokesperson said.
Hundreds of people who gathered to remember the former fire chief fatally shot at a weekend rally for former president Donald Trump were urged to find “unity” as the area in rural Pennsylvania sought to recover from the assassination attempt. Wednesday’s public event was the first of two to memorialize and celebrate Corey Comperatore’s life. The second, a visitation for friends, was planned for Thursday at Laube Hall in Freeport.
Joe Scarborough, the host of the MSNBC show Morning Joe and an ally of Joe Biden, has called on the president’s aides to “help the man they love and do the right thing” by helping him leave the presidential race. Scarborough, speaking on Thursday’s show, said: “It’s really incumbent on people that are around Joe Biden to step up at this point and help the president. Help the man they love and do the right thing. This is not going to end well if it continues to drag out.”
Barack Obama has told allies in recent days that Joe Biden’s path to victory has greatly diminished and he thinks the president needs to seriously consider the viability of his candidacy, according to a report.
Democratic party congressional leaders and close friends will persuade Joe Biden to decide to withdraw his re-election bid as early as this weekend, according to top Democrats.
Concerns are swirling among Democrats over whether the Teamsters labor union will back Joe Biden in his re-election bid, according to a report. It comes after Teamsters president Sean O’Brien delivered an address at this year’s RNC in which he called Trump “one tough SOB” following his assassination attempt.
Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato secretary general, has said Europe must not fall into the trap of creating a “self-fulfilling prophecy” that Nato would die under a second Trump presidency and that the transatlantic bond would be over.
David Lammy, the British foreign secretary, has said he is already engaging with Donald Trump’s controversial running mate, JD Vance, and can identify with him because of their common working class and Christian backgrounds.
Richard Grenell, a former US ambassador to Germany, has condemned journalists for comparing Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler. “I believe it was a total divine intervention,” Grenell told reporters as he reflected on the attempted assassination of the former president.
The Sunrise Movement, a youth-led climate change activist organization, has issued a statement condemning the Republican national convention for staying silent regarding the environment because “their agenda is politically toxic.”
Mike Johnson, the House speaker, has called on the president to fire Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle following Donald Trump’s assassination attempt last weekend.
Updated
Biden beginning to accept he may have to quit campaign - report
Joe Biden has begun to accept the idea that he may not be able to win the 5 November presidential election and may have to drop out of the race, the New York Times just reported, citing several people close to the president, Reuters reports.
The newspaper itself reports Biden appears to be softening his position from a hard no to contemplating the he may need to bow to the growing demands of many anxious members of his party.
Updated
