Author: Trevor Hunnicutt and Jeff Mason
WASHINGTON/REHOBOTH BEACH, Del. (Reuters) – U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris will headline a fundraiser in Massachusetts on Saturday as President Joe Biden faces pressure from Democrats There has been continued pressure from party colleagues and big-money donors to end his troubled campaign.
Biden and top aides vowed on Friday to continue the campaign, even as major donors said they were unwilling to open their checkbooks unless the 81-year-old president stepped down.
The crisis in confidence in Biden’s ability to win has thrust into the spotlight Harris, who is widely seen as the most likely successor should he step down.
Her fundraisers, including one on Saturday in Provincetown, Mass., are generating more interest from donors who want to signal their willingness to build around her bid for the White House, according to three Democratic fundraisers. Possibilities unite.
The fundraiser is hosted by celebrity wedding planner Bryan Rafanelli and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is expected to speak, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Thirty-five congressional Democrats, representing more than 10% of Congress, are now publicly calling for Biden, who is quarantining at his home in Delaware with COVID-19, to quit after a disastrous campaign last month. of the debate against the Democrats.
Democratic former President Bill Clinton and former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton privately supported Biden’s decision to stay in the race and actively encouraged donors to stay with him, NBC News reported Saturday, citing two people familiar with the matter. .
Separately, U.S. Rep. Mark Takano of California on Saturday became the latest Democratic congressman to call on Biden to resign as presidential candidate.
Biden’s campaign hopes to raise a massive donation of about $50 million for the Biden Victory Fund in July, but as of Friday, it was expected to raise less than that amount, according to two sources familiar with the fundraising effort. half of.
The campaign called reports of a July fundraising decline exaggerated, noting that it expected big donations to be down due to the holidays. It said there are still 10 fundraisers for the event this month.
Harris assured major Democratic donors on Friday that the party will prevail in the presidential election as a growing number of lawmakers call on her running mate Joe Biden to step down.
“We are going to win this election,” she said on a call that was improvised to reassure donors, according to a person on the call. “We know which candidate in this election puts the American people first: our President Joe Biden.”
One of the people said Harris participated in the call “at the direct request of the president’s senior advisers,” a claim confirmed by another person familiar with the matter.
