George Clooney says Biden should drop out, can't win in November
- George Clooney called on Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 race.
- Clooney said that Biden was as diminished at a recent mega fundraiser as he was during the disastrous debate.
George Clooney on Wednesday called on President Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 race just weeks after co-hosting a star-studded fundraiser for the president's campaign.
"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," Clooney wrote in a column for The New York Times. "He wasn't even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate."
Keeping Biden on the ballot, Clooney said would court disaster for the entire party this November.
"We are not going to win in November with this president," the actor wrote. "On top of that, we won't win the House, and we're going to lose the Senate. This isn't only my opinion; this is the opinion of every senator and congress member and governor that I've spoken with in private. Every single one, irrespective of what he or she is saying publicly."
Clooney's broadside comes as congressional Democrats continue to grapple over what to do about Biden following his disastrous debate performance. Some Hollywood bigwigs, including Netflix cofounder Reed Hastings and IAC chairman Barry Diller, have also backed away from Biden.
Clooney's decision to speak out may cause others to speak out. Shortly after the column was posted, legendary director Rob Reiner called on the president to step aside.
"We acknowledge all he has done for our country," Reiner wrote on X. "But Democracy is facing an existential threat. We need someone younger to fight back."
Biden has repeatedly declared that he's not going anywhere, but there are still murmurs in Washington and elsewhere about his standing. Before Clooney's column was published, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi notably ignored Biden's declaration that he was staying in the race during an interview on MSNBC. Seven House Democrats, including a pair of the chamber's most vulnerable incumbents, have called on Biden to step aside.
The president has tried to portray the backlash against him as simply "the elites," something Clooney's public break will likely feed into. But the Academy-Award winner is more than just an A-lister. As he wrote, he's been a loyal Democrat. Clooney, Julia Roberts, and Barbra Streisand helped Biden raise roughly $30 million, a jaw-dropping sum, during a June fundraising event that also featured former President Barack Obama.
"I'm a lifelong Democrat; I make no apologies for that. I'm proud of what my party represents and what it stands for," Clooney wrote.
The White House has some recently reported tension with Clooney before Wednesday's news.
According to The Washington Post, the actor called one of Biden's top aides, Steve Ricchetti, to complain about the president's denouncement of the International Criminal Court's decision to charge both Israeli and Hamas leaders with war crimes. Human rights attorney Amal Clooney, the actor's wife, helped convince the Hague to act.
In his Times column, Clooney added that he help put on, "some of the biggest fund-raisers in my party's history. Barack Obama in 2012. Hillary Clinton in 2016. Joe Biden in 2020."
A spokesperson for Biden's campaign pointed back to the president's statements that he's not going anywhere.
"The question of how to move forward has been well-aired for over a week now," Biden wrote in a letter to House Democrats on Monday. "And it's time for it to end."