President Biden said he stepped down from the presidential race because staying in would negatively hurt his colleagues.
“The polls we had showed that it was a neck and neck race, woulda been down to the wire. But what happened was a number of my Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate thought that I was gonna hurt them in the races. And I was concerned if I stayed in the race, that would be the topic,” Mr. Biden said on “CBS Sunday Mornings.”
“You’d be interviewing me about why did Nancy Pelosi say, why did so — and — and I thought it’d be a real distraction, number one,” he said, adding that a second reason for him not to run was “maintaining this democracy.”
He said that beating former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, in November is “the most important thing.”
Mr. Biden dropped out of the presidential race late last month amid growing calls for him to step down after his poor debate performance against Mr. Trump.
He quickly backed Vice President Kamala Harris, who has secured the nomination and selected a running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
The switch from Mr. Biden to Ms. Harris revitalized the response to the Democratic Party. According to 538 averages of polls, Ms. Harris leads Mr. Trump by roughly 2 percentage points nationally.
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.
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