Democrats reflect on 2024 loss amid reports highlighting Biden's decline
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Former President Joe Biden greets Sen. Chris Murphy after he finished his last Foreign Policy speech at the State Department on January 13. Photo: Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images
Some Democrats on Sunday expressed a collective responsibility for the party's 2024 election loss amid concerns about former President Biden's mental fitness.
The big picture: Audio obtained by Axios from Biden's October 2023 interviews with special counsel Robert Hur, coupled with new reports that suggested lapses in the former president's memory, have become fodder as Democrats chart their course forward.
- Hur asserted last year that a jury would likely perceive Biden as a "sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory," a characterization the then-president's legal counsel described as using "highly prejudicial language."
- Today, many Democrats agree Biden should not have pursued a second term.
Driving the news: "I think we all bear responsibility," said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) on NBC News' "Meet the Press" Sunday.
- He added, "In retrospect, you can't defend what the Democratic Party did because we are stuck with a madman, with a corrupt president in the Oval Office, and we should have given ourselves a better chance to win."
- Murphy reflected on his time working with the president throughout 2022 on bipartisan gun reform legislation and in 2023 on Middle East developments. At the time, he said, he saw "a president who was in control."
- But by 2024, Murphy said, the "American public had made up their mind ... that they wanted the Democratic Party to nominate somebody new, and it was absolutely a mistake for the party to not listen to those voters."
Zoom out: Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) struck a similar tone in a Sunday interview on ABC News' "This Week," saying, "The Democratic Party needs to be honest."
- Khanna continued, "In light of what has come out, it is painfully obvious President Biden should not have run." He said his party "played too much deference to party leaders, to the old guard, to the advisers" and needed to be "more independent."
- But the California Democrat also emphasized that Biden has led a "remarkable life" and still has "a lot to be proud of in his record," citing the Inflation Reduction Act, the CHIPS Act and the nation's COVID-19 recovery.
- However, he added, "That doesn't mean, though, that he made the right decision to seek a second term."
Yes, but: Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), who was seen as a critical Biden ally during the 2020 campaign, said on CNN's "State of the Union" that he "never saw anything" that made him think "that Joe Biden was not able to do the job."
- He did say that Biden's panic-inducing performance in last year's debate against Trump made him concerned, but he also pointed to Biden's "taxing" schedule and preparation ahead of the showdown.
Flashback: Biden dropped out of the 2024 race in July, handing the baton to then-Vice President Kamala Harris for a sprint to November. That decision, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said Sunday, was "very difficult."
- "It's hard to convince somebody to give up their car keys," Kaine said on "Fox News Sunday." "Joe Biden made the decision to give up the office of the presidency, the most powerful office in the world."
- But he contended his constituents are asking him about "economic chaos," President Trump's tariffs and protecting Medicaid — not to "rethink" what Biden did in 2024.
The bottom line: As Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said on CBS News' "Face the Nation," "hindsight is 20/20."
Go deeper: Scoop: Democrats' oldest lawmakers are mostly running again
