President Biden’s performance in Atlanta debate derailed his re-election bid

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) — Despite widespread speculation that such a move was imminent, President Joe Biden’s announcement that he would end his 2024 reelection bid continues to send shockwaves across the country’s political spectrum, particularly in Georgia, which propelled him to the Oval Office four years ago.

Biden’s announcement came Sunday, just weeks before the 2024 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and just days after Republicans solidified their support for former President Donald Trump at the Republican convention in Milwaukee.

Biden also ended his re-election bid despite a letter from several state Democratic party chairs, including U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams, urging him to stay in the race.

“We write as the Democratic Party Chairs of the seven states that tipped the scales for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in the 2020 election — and who will decide which presidential candidate reaches 270 Electoral College votes in 2024. We know how to win elections in our states,” the letter reads. “And we know that Democrats can and will win at every level of the ballot, from President Biden and Vice President Harris to state legislative candidates in tight seats and school board races. The key ingredient is something that depends on all of us: focus.”

In addition to Williams, who chairs the Georgia Democratic Party, the letter was signed by the state party chairs of Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada.

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After Trump’s speech at the Republican National Committee’s final night, Biden called for party unity to confront Trump. He also sought to resist pressure from top Democrats to withdraw from the 2024 election to make way for a new candidate and avoid massive losses.

But on Sunday, Biden posted this message on social media:

Later, in another social media post, Biden endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to become the 47th President of the United States:

Stacey Abrams, the two-time unsuccessful Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia, praised Biden on social media:

Biden has finally caved to enormous pressure from within his own party, a slide that began after his disastrous debate performance — at least for Democrats — against Trump in Atlanta.

During the debate, Biden often appeared confused and disoriented and had difficulty finishing his thoughts and sentences.

In the weeks that followed, Biden held a major press conference, conducted two national network interviews and several others, appeared on national television after an assassination attempt on Trump, and went into isolation after a COVID-19 diagnosis.

Biden is the first sitting president since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968 to end his re-election campaign, and the first in U.S. history to end his re-election campaign after winning virtually every primary in his party.

Biden has strong ties to Georgia:

• In 2020, he became the first Democrat since Bill Clinton in 1992 to win Georgia – or any other Deep South state – in a presidential election;
• Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens is a staunch Biden supporter, as is Williams, the Atlanta congresswoman who now occupies the late John Lewis’ former seat;

• Former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms is a campaign adviser;
• Biden delivered the 2024 Morehouse College commencement address.

Had Biden remained in the race, he and Trump would have become the first two presidential candidates to face each other in consecutive elections since 1956, when Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower defeated Democrat Adlai Stevenson in a repeat of the 1952 election.

This story is developing.

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