(FOX40.COM) — Rep. Ami Bera (D- Calif.) declined to definitively say that President Joe Biden should end his re-election campaign but said he believes his party would be in a better position going into the 2024 election with someone else at the top of the ticket.
“My true feeling is based on objective data, based on the fact that you have to raise hundreds of millions of dollars and it seems like the donors that write those big checks are holding onto their checkbooks,” the Sacramento-area representative said in an interview with Nikki Laurenzo for Inside California Politics. “I think the Biden campaign is in bad shape and would be better served by having a new candidate.”
Bera said it’s ultimately up to Biden to step aside but that he understands why some of his colleagues have concerns.
“I think the reason why you’re seeing people like [Represenatives] Adam Schiff, Zoe Lofgren today, others come out is they’re looking at data that is starting to come out,” Bera said. “Polling that suggests in the battleground states and perhaps down ballot in the Senate and House races things are moving in the wrong direction.”
“As his own campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon— who’s one of the best operators out there in the Democratic party— said there’s been a little bit of slippage,” Bera said. “In a race as close as this, a race we barely won in 2020, less than 100,000 votes across a handful of states, a little bit of slippage means you’ve lost.”
Bera believes his party should nominate fellow Californian Vice President Kamala Harris to be the next President of the United States should Biden step aside.
“She’s the logical choice,” Bera said. “She’s been at his side for 3 and a half years. She gets some national security briefs on a daily basis with the president. She’s been a part of a lot of the decisions that they’ve made in this Biden-Harris administration and she would inherit the campaign apparatus. So she’s the logical person and I think she’s ready to do the job.”
However, Harris’s nomination wouldn’t be automatic and the representative from Elk Grove has some ideas for how a successor should be chosen this late in the campaign season.
“We quickly have to decide, is it better to have a small mini-primary?” Bera said. Would that strengthen her? I think she would come out on top but would that unify the party?”
“Maybe three or four candidates for four weeks, debates, town halls, speaking to the public,” the congressman suggested. “Then go into the convention in a couple weeks, come together, have some objective process that selected out nominee and rally behind that nominee. That could build momentum and change the trajectory of this race”
