Amid the Democrats’ chaotic meltdown over President Biden’s Thursday night debate performance, one image stood out: A shrewd observer on X.com posted a video of a baseball pitcher just off the field dramatically engaged in big, arm-circle warm-ups.
“Gavin stretching in the bullpen,” the observer commented.
The pithy remark itself wasn’t too much of a stretch. Gavin Newsom, in fact, was already on deck, albeit figuratively. Before the debate, the photogenic 56-year-old California governor with the slick hair and silver tongue worked the pre-debate spin room as Biden’s top surrogate. And, after the year-long rumors that he could step in to replace the president as the nominee if Biden’s deteriorating health or performance should force Biden to step aside, Newsom had mastered his response to the persistent questions about it.
Asked about whether Biden should step down, Newsom appeared irritated. “Do you think it’s unfounded?” an MSNBC reporter asked him.
“I think it’s unhelpful – and I think it’s unnecessary,” Newsom replied. “We’ve got to keep our head high, and as I say, we’ve got to have the back of this president. You don’t turn your back because of one performance. What kind of party does that?”
Talking to reporters in the post-debate “spin room,” Newsom maintained that his party “could not be more wholly united behind Biden” and argued the president should not step aside. Despite Newsom’s protests, the intra-party conversations already had shifted – possibly irrevocably.
“Biden managed to change the narrative tonight – he sunk his campaign,” declared CNN’s Chris Wallace.
Right after the debate, MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace acknowledged that frank conversations were occurring among party leaders and inside Biden’s circle about whether the president should “be in this race tomorrow morning.”
One senior Democratic operative told RCP he and his colleagues were rattled to the core and expressed concern that even the cable network most sympathetic to the president was discussing whether the party should replace him on the ticket.
The person next in line wasn’t having any of it. Like Newsom, Vice President Kamala Harris swatted away questions about Biden’s performance – and wouldn’t go near talk of succession.
“Yes, it was a slow start, but it was a strong finish,” she said. “And what became very clear through the course of the debate is that [the president] is fighting on behalf of the American people. On substance, on policy, on performance, Joe Biden is extraordinarily strong.”
But the doubts were not so easily dispelled, and even MSNBC engaged in a post-debate discussion about a contested Democratic Party convention.
