Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado came closer than any other Democratic senator has yet to calling for President Joe Biden to bow out of the presidential race.
Bennet appeared on CNN’s “The Source with Kaitlan Collins” Tuesday evening after Axios reported earlier in the day that he was among three Democratic senators who privately expressed they do not think Biden can win the election in November.
Bennet told Collins he was there to confirm publicly that he doesn’t think Biden can win.
“I just think the race is on a trajectory that is very worrisome,” Bennet said, “if you care about the future of this country.”
Bennet cited polling that suggests former President Donald Trump is ahead of Biden and pointed out that at this point in 2020, Biden was polling ahead of Trump, as was Hillary Clinton in 2016.
“Donald Trump is on track, I think, to win the election, and maybe win it by a landslide, and take with him the Senate and the House,” Bennet said.
“I think that we could lose the whole thing,” he said, adding, “The stakes could not be higher.”
Though he stopped short of answering whether or not he’d call on Biden to bow out, Bennet said it was a discussion that needs to be had.
He also said the White House had not done enough after Biden’s disastrous debate performance to demonstrate they had a plan to win the election and win the battleground states.
In a statement provided to Business Insider, Biden campaign spokesperson Kevin Munoz defended the president’s commitment to beating Trump in November.
“This was always going to be a close race — and the dynamics at play are the ones we’ve long anticipated: voters continue to be deeply concerned by Donald Trump and his harmful agenda, and the more we engage and reach out to voters, the more they support President Biden,” the statement said. “There are a lot of days between now and election day, and the hard work of earning every single vote is far from over.”
The campaign also noted the many expressions of support Biden has received from House and Senate Democrats since the debate.
When Collins pressed Bennet on whether he could see himself eventually calling for Biden to bow out, he did not answer directly but said the White House needed to be doing more to assuage voters, adding, “I think it’s critically important they address the concerns of the American people, not ignore them.”
“If we just sit on our hands, if we say we’re going to disregard what is plainly in front of us and plainly in front of the American people, and we end up electing Donald Trump again as president of the United States, that’s going to be a huge tragedy beyond epic proportion,” he said. “And it’s something I can’t live with.”
A representative for Bennet did not immediately respond to a request for comment from BI.
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