Peggy Noonan Bluntly Makes the Case For Biden to Drop Out: Be a ‘Hero’ or Be ‘Ruth Bader Biden’

AP Photo/Evan Vucci

Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan made the case in brutal and stark terms on Friday for why President Joe Biden should step aside and let another Democrat run against Donald Trump in 2024. Noonan, a former speech writer for President Ronald Reagan and veteran columnist, went point by point dispelling all the various rationalizations Democrats are telling themselves for why they are “resigned” to sticking with Biden.

Almost halfway through her column, she takes on the notion that replacing Biden is “too big a gamble.”

“Backing Mr. Biden is a gamble. Bookmakers give him a nearly 70% chance of losing,” she writes, moving on to knock down two other rationalizations:

The family won’t go for it. They aren’t the arbiters of American history; the White House isn’t their candy store.

He will never change his mind. Barack Obama dissuaded him from running for president in 2016.

“If Mr. Biden steps aside, sacrificing all vanity and need, he is a hero to his party forever. If he stays and loses, he’s Ruth Bader Biden. They’ll never forgive him. His legacy is the second Trump term,” Noonan writes, pulling no punches in offering Biden her take on the historic moment he faces.

“Has anyone had The Talk with him, his family and staff? All the odds laid out, the arguments made, a plea spoken? Has anyone been frank, candid, tough?” she then asks, adding:

If not, why not? Donors love to talk, so do senators and governors.

We end with the famous political intervention that took place 50 years ago this summer, in August 1974. Sen. Barry Goldwater, Sen. Hugh Scott and House Minority Leader John Rhodes went to Richard Nixon to tell him it was over.

Other rationalizations Noonan bats down included: “It’s too late,” “But the American people would see chaos,” and, “What about the Kamala problem?”

Noonan deftly cites President Lyndon B. Johnson dropping his reelection bid on March 31, 1968, to knock down concerns its too late for Biden to drop out and the Democrats to hold a primary – one in which she notes Kamala Harris will be free to run in. As for the chaos, Noonan argues the American public is currently obsessed with chaos and anything the Democrats can do to stop Trump from dominating the news cycle is a good thing.

Read the full column here.