Speaker 1: From Schwartz Media. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven AM.
Speaker 1: With just over one hundred days to go until the
Speaker 1: US election, President Joe Biden has announced his dropping out
Speaker 1: of the race. In a letter posted to X, he said,
Speaker 1: I believe it is in the best interest of my
Speaker 1: party and the country for me to stand down and
Speaker 1: focus solely on fulfilling my duties as president for the
Speaker 1: remainder of my term. Biden's announcement comes after weeks of
Speaker 1: intensifying pressure from donors and colleagues, concerned he was facing
Speaker 1: certain defeat by Trump. The question now is whether the
Speaker 1: Democrats will unite around Karmala Harris, president Biden's pick for
Speaker 1: his successor. Today, senior fellow at the United States Studies
Speaker 1: Center Bruce Wolpy on the key players who pushed Biden
Speaker 1: out and whether Karmala Harris can win. It's Tuesday, July
Speaker 1: twenty three. Bruce, Hello, welcome back to seven AM.
Speaker 2: Wonderful to be here, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Ever since that disastrous perst debate against Trump, Biden has
Speaker 1: been under this intense and growing pressure to step aside.
Speaker 1: Yet he and He's inner circle they have seemed completely
Speaker 1: immovable until this moment, So why did he cave?
Speaker 2: Now, you're exactly right. And so this all happened on
Speaker 2: Sunday in the United States. Well, Sunday morning was a
Speaker 2: continuation of the fierce reporting that Biden was angry, he
Speaker 2: was resentful, he wasn't going anywhere. He had announced he
Speaker 2: was going to campaign in this coming week. He felt betrayed,
Speaker 2: he felt underappreciated, and he hated it. He said, I
Speaker 2: am the nominee. I was in the primaries. I want
Speaker 2: millions of votes, got all the delegates, and you're telling
Speaker 2: me I can't be the nominee of our party. Look,
Speaker 2: I'm not a young guy.
Speaker 1: That's no secret. But here's the deal.
Speaker 2: I understand how to get things done for the American people.
Speaker 2: He entered the twenty twenty presidential campaign to do one thing,
Speaker 2: stop Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: Donald Trump believes the job of the presidents to take
Speaker 3: care of Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: He said in twenty twenty four, I am the best
Speaker 2: to stop Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: I know him well, and I know the danger he
Speaker 3: presents to our democracy, and we've been down this road before.
Speaker 2: And so for him to be denied that opportunity when
Speaker 2: he fervently believed he was the best he didn't believe
Speaker 2: the polls, he didn't believe the material the people were
Speaker 2: bringing him. But the key thing to watch in this
Speaker 2: were about five or six pivotal people President Obama, President Clinton,
Speaker 2: the former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who is
Speaker 2: the most cunning and revered strategists that the Democrats have,
Speaker 2: the Leader of the House Hakim Jeffreys Democrat and the
Speaker 2: maori Arty leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, and the
Speaker 2: most prominent Black representative in Congress, Jim Clyburn, whose support
Speaker 2: for Biden in twenty twenty sealed his nomination and ultimately
Speaker 2: his victory. And most of them, Clyburn aside, we're hearing
Speaker 2: from their members that we're dead. We will go down
Speaker 2: with him. Trump will win, he will win control of Congress.
Speaker 2: He will have an unfettered hand to rule with an
Speaker 2: iron fist, and we can't let this happen. All these
Speaker 2: leaders ultimately met with Biden, and finally there was a
Speaker 2: realization by the President and his staff, who's been loyal
Speaker 2: with him for decades and who are excellent, that this
Speaker 2: is over. He's going to lose, and it's going to
Speaker 2: be a catastrophe for the Democratic party, and ultimately he
Speaker 2: had to accept it.
Speaker 1: And it's not just Biden's Democratic colleagues that have been
Speaker 1: losing faith in him, is it its donors as well?
Speaker 1: How critical has that fact been for Biden?
Speaker 2: Well, if you're in a jet plane, you need fuel
Speaker 2: and when the fuel runs out, you crash. And Yeah,
Speaker 2: when George Clooney says I'm not doing any more money
Speaker 2: for you, well it gets everyone's attention.
Speaker 1: Disney eras Abigail Disney withdrawing her support.
Speaker 2: Telling CNBC yesterday that she plans to stop all donations
Speaker 2: as long as the president remains the front runner. What's
Speaker 2: really interesting is in the first hours of Kamala Harris
Speaker 2: saying that she is running tens and tens of millions
Speaker 2: of dollars from small dollar contributors has flown in. So yes,
Speaker 2: money is the mother's milk of American politics, and it
Speaker 2: was pretty important.
Speaker 1: And Joe Biden he's endorsed his vice president Kamala Harris,
Speaker 1: and she has said that her intention is to earn
Speaker 1: and win this nomination. So what does that process actually
Speaker 1: look like.
Speaker 2: We've never been here before, so we don't have clear
Speaker 2: definition of it. It's unprecedented. Yeah, you know, I get
Speaker 2: tired of saying how unprecedented we are in these unprecedented times,
Speaker 2: But no major parties Canadon for president has dropped out
Speaker 2: of a presidential race this close to the election throughout
Speaker 2: American history. A lot depends on who else enters the
Speaker 2: race and wants to get the nomination, And I think
Speaker 2: the party will probably set up some events around the
Speaker 2: country where whoever is contesting the nomination will have debates
Speaker 2: or town halls or whatever, so you get a sense
Speaker 2: of them and how they're doing. But question is, do
Speaker 2: you have a sort of clean process or a messy
Speaker 2: process where some people get in a race and they say,
Speaker 2: I don't want Kamala Harris, You've got to stick with me,
Speaker 2: and you divide the party. Now, I think at the end,
Speaker 2: given the stakes involved, that the party will work a
Speaker 2: process that finds itself coalescing around Kamala Harris in the
Speaker 2: Democratic Convention which begins August nineteenth.
Speaker 1: After the break, can Kamala Harris beat Donald Trump? Bruce? If,
Speaker 1: as you're predicting, the whole party does get behind Kamala
Speaker 1: Harris without this traditional nomination process playing out, does that
Speaker 1: leave the Democrats open to criticism that they're acting undemocratically.
Speaker 2: Yes, it could, and I think that we got a
Speaker 2: little flavor of that today. President Obama made public a
Speaker 2: letter to the American people on Joe Biden's presidency and
Speaker 2: it was really high praise for what Biden and his
Speaker 2: legacy will be. And then people are saying, oh, he
Speaker 2: didn't endorse Kamala Harris. Does that mean he's not for
Speaker 2: Kamala Harris? And I think two things. First, that President Obama,
Speaker 2: being the man that he is, understands that this is
Speaker 2: a day for Joe Biden, this is a day for
Speaker 2: honoring his presidency, and that if he had endorsed Kamala
Speaker 2: Harris in the same breath, well, then that inside baseball
Speaker 2: deal would be a parent. Ah, they all conspired, it's
Speaker 2: all in. It was all a plot. And so I
Speaker 2: think there will be some distance between what happened today
Speaker 2: with President Biden and other very prominent people coming in
Speaker 2: to support her.
Speaker 1: And we know that the Trump campaign they've already been
Speaker 1: preparing for a race against Kamala Harris. Tell me about
Speaker 1: what their line of attack against her will be.
Speaker 2: With Kamala Harris, they'll attacker is a radical extremist, communist,
Speaker 2: deep state type person, the very figurine that they hate.
Speaker 2: They're going to go after her appearance, their voice, how
Speaker 2: she talks, her mannerisms and so forth. But there are
Speaker 2: a couple things here. She's a prosecutor. She was district
Speaker 2: attorney in San Francisco, attorney general of the state of California.
Speaker 2: She goes after criminals. Well, guess what Trump is a
Speaker 2: convicted felon. She's going to attack him, and he hasn't
Speaker 2: faced that kind of criticism from the Democratic nominee throughout
Speaker 2: this campaign. Effective criticisms, criticism that sticks, and I think
Speaker 2: she will make every effort to make it stick. The
Speaker 2: other thing about Trump is I don't think he has
Speaker 2: high regard for women, women that have been prominent and powerful.
Speaker 2: He attacks. He calls Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker, crazy Nancy.
Speaker 2: If you're a prominent anchor at Fox News, he says
Speaker 2: horrific things about you, the same about journalists at MSNBC.
Speaker 2: And so I think a woman of color presents a
Speaker 2: really rich target for him to denigrate. And in Australia,
Speaker 2: we've learned from Julia Gillard over ten years ago, what
Speaker 2: can happen to a woman who becomes who can test
Speaker 2: the position.
Speaker 1: And it was Biden's debate performance that really led us
Speaker 1: to this moment. So will we see another debate against Trump?
Speaker 1: And if so, how would Kamala Harris perform against him?
Speaker 2: She is a debater, She was in the Senate for
Speaker 2: many years, so I think she has all the attributes
Speaker 2: to do it. She also has a wealth of experience
Speaker 2: from being vice president for almost four years. She is
Speaker 2: in all the meetings, she goes overseas on missions for him.
Speaker 2: I think she's underestimated, and in politics, you always want
Speaker 2: to be underestimated. On the other hand, if she makes bloopers,
Speaker 2: if she misssteps, and in her early days as vice president,
Speaker 2: she was not effective in the media. She was uneasy,
Speaker 2: she had staff churn, She was weak on immigration, she
Speaker 2: didn't establish her mandate over that. But she's evolved. She
Speaker 2: has grown as vice president. When Florida passed a really
Speaker 2: restrictive a six week ban on abortions, she went immediately
Speaker 2: on the day after the legislature did that, and she
Speaker 2: confronts the governor, confronts the voters in Florida. It was
Speaker 2: a stunning coup.
Speaker 3: This is a fight for freedom the fundamental freedom to
Speaker 3: make decisions about one's own body and not have their
Speaker 3: government tell them what they're supposed to do.
Speaker 2: When there's a massacre, gun mass current schools, she goes
Speaker 2: there and says, why are we doing this? Aren't we
Speaker 2: better than this?
Speaker 3: So part of line I'm here today is to challenge
Speaker 3: every state has a red flag law.
Speaker 2: So I think she has that ability and will see it.
Speaker 2: I don't know whether Trump actually wants to debate Kamala Harris,
Speaker 2: because there's only one way that can go. I think
Speaker 2: he'd probably be afraid of debating her, and I think
Speaker 2: he doesn't want to give her too much prominence and attention.
Speaker 2: In other words, who's this selection going to be a
Speaker 2: referendum on on Kamala Harris or Donald Trump. If it's
Speaker 2: on Kamala Harris, she'll probably lose. If it's on Trump,
Speaker 2: the Democrats will probably win.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think it's fair to say that until this moment,
Speaker 1: Harris has been in Biden's shadow. Her approval ratings their week,
Speaker 1: and there is a lot of uncertainty around whether she
Speaker 1: can actually meet this challenge. Even if she does run
Speaker 1: the absolute best version of her campaign, I still wonder
Speaker 1: if she can win against Trump, because it seems unlikely
Speaker 1: right now that anyone could with less than four months
Speaker 1: to go. Trump has never seemed stronger.
Speaker 2: That is exactly right. And if you look at the
Speaker 2: swing states, they've been going hard towards Trump since the debate,
Speaker 2: and that's trouble. On the other hand, what Biden was
Speaker 2: suffering from was a lack of enthusiasm. Now I think
Speaker 2: Harris can regenerate a lot of enthusiasm, particularly younger voters,
Speaker 2: I think, among black voters, among women, among some Hispanic Americans,
Speaker 2: and so she has a chance to get some ground back.
Speaker 2: It's uphill, absolutely.
Speaker 1: So as we speak, Kamala Harris is on the brink
Speaker 1: of making history. She would be the first woman of
Speaker 1: color to be a presidential nominee, and if she were
Speaker 1: to win, she would be the first female president. Do
Speaker 1: you think that those facts about her have the power
Speaker 1: to galvanize voters, that Harris is someone who can convince
Speaker 1: people enough people to turn out and to vote for her.
Speaker 2: I think next month is really crucial in that regard.
Speaker 2: If she has a good performance, she brings the party together,
Speaker 2: if she gets enthusiastic crowds in groups of Americans, who
Speaker 2: were not going to vote for Joe Biden. Then the
Speaker 2: answer is yes, Trump is not going to lose any
Speaker 2: of his voters. The question is can she accumulate enough
Speaker 2: voters to out vote those guys And just as Biden did,
Speaker 2: you know, seven million votes in twenty twenty. So to
Speaker 2: be seen, but it's going to be really.
Speaker 1: Interesting, Bruce, Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. It's only the future of the
Speaker 2: free world. We'll see how we go.
Speaker 1: Also in the news today, tens of millions of dollars
Speaker 1: in donations continue to flow into the Democrats campaign coffers
Speaker 1: as backers show support for Kamala Harris as the preferred candidate.
Speaker 1: Harris raised over twenty seven point five million US dollars
Speaker 1: in just the first five hours of per campaign on Sunday.
Speaker 1: By nighttime, that figure had grown to nearly fifty million,
Speaker 1: according to fundraising platform act Blue. The donations are largely
Speaker 1: coming from small dollar or grassroots supporters. VP Karmala Harris
Speaker 1: also stands to inherit around ninety six million US dollars
Speaker 1: in President Biden's campaign fund, and Australia is one of
Speaker 1: several nations to respond to the weekend's landmark ICJ ruling,
Speaker 1: which found that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories is in
Speaker 1: violation of international law. The ruling marks the first time
Speaker 1: the ICJ has handed down an advisory opinion on the
Speaker 1: legality of Israel's occupation of the Gaza Strip, West Bank
Speaker 1: and East Jerusalem. The ruling called for Israel to end
Speaker 1: its occupation and that it's obligated to pay reparations for
Speaker 1: the harm coust. Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in statement
Speaker 1: the government is carefully considering the ICJ ruling and said
Speaker 1: they want to see concrete science taken to end the settlement.
Speaker 1: Over the weekend, is Rail Prime Minister Benjamin Ettniahu called
Speaker 1: the court's ruling a quote decision of lies. I'm Ruby Jones.
Speaker 1: This is seven am. See you tomorrow.