Politics

(WASHINGTON) — Marianne Williamson, the author and speaker who ran against President Joe Biden in the 2024 and 2020 primaries, sounded the alarm Tuesday evening over Biden’s ability to campaign and serve as commander-in-chief amid concerns over his age and cognitive health.

In an interview with Kyra Phillips on ABC News Live, Williamson slammed Democratic leadership for backing Biden after his politically disastrous debate against 2024 opponent Donald Trump earlier this month.

“I think the Democratic leadership completely underestimates the level of disgust that Americans are feeling due to their cowardice, due to their hypocrisy. You know, the issue is not just crisis; it’s crisis management. And they are failing at crisis management,” Williamson told Phillips.

Williamson said the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate should push for change.

“If [Biden] doesn’t want to give up the delegates, he doesn’t have to. It’s called an intervention. It’s called Hakeem Jeffries and Senator Schumer and whomever else walking into a room with the president, with the First Lady, with Hunter – whomever – and saying, this has got to stop. You are risking our victory in November,” Williamson said.

While leadership has said they’re with Biden, seven House Democrats have publicly called on the president to step down from the ticket since the showdown, even as additional information over his health and mental acuity has surfaced.

Rep. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey on Tuesday joined Reps. Raúl Grivalja, Lloyd Doggett, Mike Quigley, Seth Moulton and Angie Craig in calling for Biden to withdraw from the race. Over a dozen senators and over 40 House members have publicly declared their support for Biden.

The presidential primary cycle concluded in June, with Biden earning over 99% of the Democratic delegates. Williamson was on the ballot in most states and territories this election cycle, notwithstanding a brief suspension of her candidacy in February before shortly jumping back into the race.

She said at the end of the primary cycle that she was no longer a candidate for the party’s nomination because the 2024 presidential preference contests had ended. Williamson was the first Democrat to jump in the primary this cycle, announcing her candidacy in February 2023.

“I’ve been challenging him for a year and a half, and I understand why these people are afraid. This crowd is tough. This crowd is vicious. This crowd smears. They lie, they suppress candidacies. And the elected politicians in the Democratic Party know they’re – they’re hearing the warning; they’re hearing the threat, and they know that it’s true,” Williamson said.

While she was a candidate, Williamson seldom discussed Biden’s age. In the weeks since the debate, she has been vocal in urging him to step down.

“I started all this feeling a lot of compassion for him. This had to have been a very humiliating experience. … What is happening now is not deserving of respect. No one person is indispensable,” Williamson said on Tuesday.

“We’re not only being asked: can the president handle the next four months of the campaign? It is reasonable for the American voter to ask: can he handle the next four years of the presidency?” We heard him be strong on ‘Morning Joe’ the other day. But the president of the United States can’t be episodically strong. The president of the United States cannot be episodically on top of his game,” she added.

Party leaders like Vice President Kamala Harris, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker have all been ardent in their support for Biden at the top of the ticket in 2024. On Tuesday, Williamson reasoned that those other Democrats who have been floated as possibilities to replace Biden were considering their own political futures rather than challenging Biden now.

“Because of their own cynical calculations, their own ambitions for their own careers, they won’t stand on principle and stand on what they know. And they expect the American people to turn the keys to the White House over to them, not just the White House,” Williamson said.

“We’re now risking the House and the Senate, not only because the president could drag everything down,” she added.

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(WASHINGTON) — Eager to turn the page from questions about his mental fitness, President Joe Biden on Tuesday officially opened NATO’s Washington Summit by announcing what he called a “historic donation” of critical new air defense capabilities to bolster Ukraine’s fight against Russia.

“Putin wants nothing less — nothing less than Ukraine’s total subjugation, to end Ukraine’s democracy, to destroy Ukraine’s culture and to wipe Ukraine off the map and we know Putin won’t stop at Ukraine,” Biden declared. “But make no mistake Ukraine can and will stop Putin.”

The commitments Biden outlined include four Patriot anti-missile batteries; the U.S., Germany and Romania will supply one each, and the fourth will be cobbled together from components provided by the Netherlands and other NATO members, according to a statement from the countries.

“The United States will make sure that when we export critical air defense interceptors, Ukraine goes to the front of the line. They will get this assistance before anyone else gets it,” Biden declared. “All told, Ukraine will receive hundreds of additional interceptors over the next year, helping protect Ukrainian cities against Russian missiles.”

Biden’s pledge of new help for Ukraine comes as performance on the world stage is being scrutinized amid questions about his political future.

Italy has also committed to providing Ukraine with another of its SAMP-T air defense systems, the joint statement said.

In his address, Biden said NATO allies would also share “dozens” of other tactical air defense systems with Ukraine in the coming months.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been urging NATO allies to fortify the country’s air defenses for months, and on Monday, an onslaught of Russian missiles underscored the dire need.

According to Ukrainian officials, the strikes killed 33 people in Kyiv, making it the deadliest attack on the capital city since Russia’s invasion began in early 2022.

Zelenskyy has said Ukraine requires seven more Patriot systems, so Biden’s announcement only partially fills that demand.

Germany and Romania had previously publicly indicated they would send Patriot batteries to Ukraine. U.S. officials had also confirmed that an American battery stationed in Poland would be transferred, but the move had not yet been formally announced.

Alliance leaders have long anticipated that ensuring Ukraine could continue to weather Moscow’s aggression would top the gathering’s agenda, but following Biden’s fumbling debate performance, the summit has also been cast as a pivotal test of his capability to serve as president for another four years.

In the days leading up to the meeting, White House officials have sought to emphasize Biden’s efforts to restore American leadership within the alliance and on the international stage more broadly — contrasting his position with Republican challenger Donald Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to leave NATO.

“An overwhelmingly bipartisan majority of Americans understand that NATO makes us all safer,” Biden said. “Americans, they know we’re stronger with our friends.”

Biden also acknowledged outgoing NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, thanking him for his pivotal leadership and honoring him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest American honor that can be bestowed upon a civilian.

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(WASHINGTON) — Russia will attempt to influence the 2024 presidential election in favor of a past preferred candidate, according to U.S. officials who briefed reporters on election threats on Tuesday

“We have not observed a shift in Russia’s preferences for the presidential race from past elections, given the role the U.S. is playing with regard to Ukraine and broader policy toward Russia,” according to an Office of the Director of National Intelligence official.

The official did not mention any specific candidate by name, despite reporters pressing for a name.

During the 2016 election, the intelligence community assessed Russia attempted to influence the U.S. election in favor of candidate Donald Trump.

Officials from a vast swath of federal agencies said that Russia is taking a “whole of government approach” to influence the election that includes the presidential race, congressional races and public opinion, according to officials.

“We anticipate them to increase their activities as we get closer to the election,” according to the ODNI official.

The Justice Department on Tuesday released information about a Russian influence campaign related to the Ukrainian war, which officials pointed to as an example of how the U.S. says Russia is hoping to influence the election.

Russia seeks to “undermine electoral integrity and amplify domestic divisions.”

“To accomplish this, Moscow is using a variety of approaches to bolster its messaging and lend an air of authenticity to its efforts,” the official said. “Russian influence actors are planning to overtly use social media to amplify narratives, to sway U.S. public opinion in U.S. swing states, and diminish U.S. support for Ukraine.”

The campaigns and candidates have been kept abreast of these efforts, according to officials.

China and Iran are also make up the “big three” of threat actors the intelligence community is focusing on.

“Russia is the preeminent threat. Iran is a chaos agent and China is holding in the presidential race,” the ODNI official said.

China, according to U.S. officials, is taking a wait-and-see approach and may not attempt to influence the outcome of the presidential race “but we are monitoring the possibility of down ballot influence activities,” as they did in 2022.

They are also focusing on their data collection on U.S. social media platforms.

Iran is seeking to sow “chaos” in the United States, official said.

“Iran seeks to stoke social divisions and undermine confidence in the US democratic institutions around the elections. Iran has demonstrated a long standing interest in exploiting U.S. political and social tensions for a variety of means, including social media. In particular, we are monitoring Iranian actors who are seeking to exacerbate tensions with Israel,” according to an ODNI official.

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(WASHINGTON) — Iranian government actors are seeking to “take advantage” of pro-Palestinian protests in the United States, according to the director of National Intelligence, including providing financial support to some protesters.

“In recent weeks, Iranian government actors have sought to opportunistically take advantage of ongoing protests regarding the war in Gaza, using a playbook we’ve seen other actors use over the years,” DNI Avril Haines said in a statement. “We have observed actors tied to Iran’s government posing as activists online, seeking to encourage protests, and even providing financial support to protesters.”

This is all part of Iran’s efforts to influence “our democratic process” according to Haines.

“The freedom to express diverse views, when done peacefully, is essential to our democracy, but it is also important to warn of foreign actors who seek to exploit our debate for their own purposes,” Haines said.

During the spring and into the summer, pro-Palestinian protesters have protested on college campuses and in other places.

“Iran is becoming increasingly aggressive in their foreign influence efforts, seeking to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions, as we have seen them do in the past, including in prior election cycles,” she said. “They continue to adapt their cyber and influence activities, using social media platforms and issuing threats. It is likely they will continue to rely on their intelligence services in these efforts, as well as Iran-based online influencers, to promote their narratives.”

In the 2020 election cycle Iranian actors sent spoof text messages around purporting to be the Proud Boys.

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(WASHINGTON) — After Joe Biden’s disastrous debate, Democrats worried about the president’s chances in November are mired in a debate of their own: shut up or shout louder.

Biden, whose decades-long career in Democratic politics has let him rack up chits across the party, has his fair share of defenders, both those who are personally allied with him and others who are worried about his chances but believe criticism of him is damaging to the party’s inevitable nominee.

But other Democrats argue his performance against former President Donald Trump was catastrophic enough that a messy conversation over his staying in the race is worth it if it means forcing him out and putting up a supposedly more electable candidate in November.

The infighting takes the “Democrats in disarray” cliché to a stratospheric level and lays bare a bitter and fundamental disagreement over what counts as messaging discipline, particularly as Republicans fall in line behind a 34-times convicted felon, twice-impeached former president in Donald Trump.

“I do not think that words can adequately describe the fury and frustration that literally every Democrat, whether a professional one or a rank-and-file voter, feels right now that Donald Trump and the Republicans, despite the lawlessness, the criminality and the radicalism, are pretty much escaping scot-free right now, while our dysfunction plays out in the limelight,” Democratic strategist Jon Reinish told ABC News

Congress’ return from recess on Monday amplified Democrats’ intraparty feud, setting off a flood of statements from lawmakers who could no longer avoid the question on the lips of virtually every reporter in Washington. Underscoring the tension surrounding the infighting, House Democrats huddled behind closed doors Tuesday, with cellphones left at the door — ostensibly to prevent real-time leaking to the salivating press corps.

Biden’s backers were vociferous in their defense of the president, pointing to his 2020 victory and subsequent accomplishments to hammer his critics.

“Joe Biden and [Vice President] Kamala Harris defeated Donald Trump in 2020 and they are the Democratic ticket that will do so again this year. Any ‘leader’ calling for President Biden to drop out needs to get their priorities straight and stop undermining this incredible actual leader who has delivered real results for our country,” said Florida Rep. Frederica Wilson.

Other Democrats were less dismissive of Biden’s halting debate performance but said that the criticism could be damaging to the president in the scenario he ends up as the party nominee — effectively helping Trump in the process.

“The drip, drip, drip of public statements of no confidence only serve to weaken a President who has been weakened not only by the debate but also by the debate about the debate,” Rep. Ritchie Torres, N.Y., wrote in X. “Weakening a weakened nominee seems like a losing strategy for a presidential election. The piling-on is not so much solving a problem as much as it is creating and compounding one.”

Biden has forecasted a strategy to reingratiate himself with voters worried about his age (81 years old). An unpromoted appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” Monday, after a Friday interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, indicated a more muscular media strategy is underway, while the president plans to ramp up his travel to swing states.

He is also taking a more aggressive stance toward even hypothetical critics, swatting away speculation that congressional leadership will join the growing chorus of voices calling for him to drop out of the presidential race.

“He basically called them punks on national TV,” said one informal adviser to Biden’s campaign.

The plan so far has done little to blunt the Democratic furor, with some party members viewing the interview with Stephanopoulos as further evidence that Biden should suspend his campaign. But some strategists said he at least bought himself time to get off the mat.

“They are executing on a plan, and I think the president deserves that folks take a beat, and let’s see. They’re trying to restore confidence. Let’s take a beat and let this plan play out,” Democratic strategist Karen Finney told ABC News last week.

Others are less forgiving.

“Biden set up a debate on his terms, on his home field, and he utterly and totally failed in the most spectacular failure in presidential debate history. He failed. Now, there’s no way he can win. So yeah, we’ve got to do this,” the informal adviser said of the push to get Biden to remove himself from the 2024 ticket.

Virtually every Democrat who said they wanted Biden off the ticket described the current situation as painful, pointing to Biden’s legislative achievements and a general admiration of his character.

But the prospect of a Trump victory looms large in the heads of some party members, overriding any goodwill there is for Biden in favor of supplanting him on November ballots.

“I feel like there’s an opportunity,” one source familiar with the Biden campaign’s strategy said of the talk of Biden’s replacement. “What is painful for some could be exciting for others. And I would just say, like I tell my kids, things have to get messy before they get clean.”

One Democratic pollster sneered at Biden’s defenders, saying talks about the president’s status as the party’s likely nominee were inevitable after the debate, especially with Democrats boasting a deep bench of rising stars.

“They didn’t watch the debate, or they’re in or they’re now in the cult,” the person said. “You can’t have watched that debate and seen a man in his early 80s who already is the oldest president to ever serve, and would be by far the oldest president ever reelected, and say that there aren’t serious concerns when there are alternatives. And that’s the other thing that makes it really, really obnoxious.”

The disagreement is particularly pronounced as Republicans walk in lockstep behind Trump, who is set to be coronated as his party’s nominee at the GOP convention next week.

Republican concerns over Trump’s leadership of the party have persisted since he launched his first campaign in 2015. Incidents like the infamous Access Hollywood tape, the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and a disappointing 2022 midterm cycle fueled speculation over if the party would move on, all to no avail. And now, dissent is scarce.

“I don’t know that it’s Teflon, per se, everybody sees the flaws and the warts. It’s the fact that there’s a large part of the party that is captivated by his message and his presumed ability to beat Joe Biden,” said GOP strategist Bob Heckman.

The dynamic marks a distillation of the two modern parties — one riven with disagreements over ideology and what counts as “electable,” and another remade in the image of its de facto leader, with policy debates largely papered over by Trump’s outsized sway and critics’ denouncements largely diminished to a grumble.

After the debate, that leaves Democrats as the party beset by endless infighting, leaving some lamenting the parties’ clashing strategies.

“Democrats want to be right, Republicans only care about winning, and that’s the difference between these two nominations right now,” one battleground Democratic strategist said. “Donald Trump’s convicted on 34 counts, not a single Republican has said, ‘he should not be our nominee.’ And because our guy’s too old, we have a complete freak out in the party that’s now going on its eighth or ninth day.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Congressional Democrats on Tuesday are gathering for a consequential day of closed-door meetings where the focus is expected to be largely on President Joe Biden’s viability as a candidate and the path for the party going forward.

House Democrats huddled Tuesday morning at the Democratic National Committee headquarters just steps from the U.S. Capitol.

In a sign of how sensitive the conversation was expected to be, lawmakers’ cellphones were collected at the door, presumably to prevent real-time leaks about the private discussion.

Members were asked by reporters if they still support Biden’s reelection bid as they entered the building. Many signaled they did, including former House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Rep. Maxine Waters, Rep. Bennie Thompson and others.

Several Democrats denounced Project 2025, a sweeping plan to overhaul the federal government proposed by a conservative group closely aligned with former President Donald Trump, as they made their way inside.

Senate Democrats are set to hold their own conference meeting on Tuesday, which would mark the first time the senators have met since Biden’s poor debate performance against Donald Trump in late June that triggered panic among some in the party about his fitness to carry out the 2024 campaign and serve another four years.

The meetings come at a pivotal moment for Biden, as calls for him to step aside from the race mounted this past week even after he and the White House ramped up outreach to anxious Democrats as it went into damage control mode.

Biden defiantly pushed back on critics on Monday, first in a blunt letter to Democrats saying it’s time for such hand-wringing to end and then in a call to MSNBC’s Morning Joe in which he railed against “elites” challenging his capabilities.

“The bottom line is, we’re not going anywhere. I am not going anywhere!” Biden told MSNBC anchors Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski.

The question now is whether Democrats fall in line behind Biden or whether questions about his candidacy continue to grow with the Democratic National Convention just weeks away.

So far, six Democrats have publicly said they do not support Biden as the nominee: Reps. Adam Smith, Angie Craig, Seth Moulton, Lloyd Doggett, Mike Quigley and Raul Grijalva.

“Any candidate for the highest office in our nation has a strong burden to bear,” Smith said in a statement on Tuesday. “That candidate must be able to clearly, articulately, and strongly make his or her case to the American people. It is clear that President Biden is no longer able to meet this burden.”

Several other senior House Democrats, besides Smith, privately told House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Sunday that they’re calling on Biden to exit the race, according to several sources with knowledge of the discussion. Jeffries did not express a position and said he would engage with the caucus throughout the week, according to one person on the call.

Biden on Monday met with Congressional Black Caucus virtually, two sources told ABC News. Black voters helped propel Biden to the White House in 2020 and are a critical voting bloc again in 2024. So far, no member of the Congressional Black Caucus has called on the president to step aside.

No Democratic senator has publicly called on Biden to withdraw from the race, but concerns have been raised by Sen. Mark Warner. Warner, who chairs the influential Senate Intelligence Committee, tried to assemble a group of Senate Democrats to discuss Biden’s path forward as early as Monday but the meeting didn’t take place.

Warner, in a statement on Tuesday, said “now is the time for conversations about the strongest path forward” given what is at stake in the November election.

“As these conversations continue, I believe it is incumbent upon the President to more aggressively make his case to the American people, and to hear directly from a broader group of voices about how to best prevent Trump’s lawlessness from returning to the White House,” Warner said.

Montana Sen. Jon Tester, one of the most vulnerable Senate Democrats up this cycle, similarly said that Biden needs to “prove” to him and voters that he’s up to the job.

Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Manchin, who became an independent earlier this year but still caucuses with Democrats, urged his colleagues to see how the coming days unfold before determining Biden’s future.

“The president has set a course of where he wants to go,” Manchin told ABC News Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott. “I think he has earned that right and he has a heck of a legacy right now with all the service he has. And just give it time.”

Manchin told reporters he believes the race is “winnable” for Biden.

“I have always said Trump is a threat to democracy,” he said. “You can’t call the race now. I mean, this is ridiculous. It’s early for people to get so excited. The bottom line is just wait until this week.”

This week, Biden will also be tested on the world stage as he hosts dozens of leaders in Washington for the 2024 NATO summit amid reports claiming U.S. allies have privately questioned his ability to lead.

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(WASHINGTON) — It was supposed to be a show of strength — the leaders of NATO’s member countries gathering in Washington, D.C., to display their remarkable unity in the face of some of the most serious threats to the alliance in its 75-year history.

Instead, the spotlight will fall on the summit’s host, President Joe Biden, and growing doubts about his capability to serve as president and represent the United States on the world stage for another four years.

But as former President Donald Trump edges ahead in some polls, the looming U.S. election in November has also infused new urgency into some of NATO’s key priorities.

Among the anticipated events of the three-day summit are a commemoration event Tuesday at the Mellon Auditorium, the site where the NATO treaty was formally signed in 1949; a bilateral meeting with newly elected U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer; a meeting with the EU and NATO’s Indo-Pacific partners; and an event with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and nearly two dozen allies and partners who have signed bilateral security agreements with Ukraine.

On Thursday evening, Biden will hold a rare solo press conference, which he hasn’t done since November.

Here are the top storylines to watch:

Biden’s next big test

After Biden’s debate performance last month ignited panic among Democrats, his campaign has been urgently searching for opportunities to undo damage and prove the president can be an effective leader for the future.

The president himself has set the stakes for the summit remarkably high. He mentioned the alliance six times during his 21-minute interview with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos on Friday, saying the event would be “a good way to judge me.”

But the optics for Biden’s campaign may not be ideal. The summit will mark the 75th anniversary of the alliance, and among its 32 members, Biden is the only head of government who was alive during its founding. The president, 81, will share stages with leaders like France’s Emmanuel Macron, Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen and plenty of other officials who are about half his age.

In preparation for the summit, officials say Biden has spent hours huddling with Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the White House — including on the eve of the summit and over the Fourth of July holiday.

Blinken is also expected to be by Biden’s side through much of the programming in Washington, according to the officials.

Despite reports claiming U.S. allies have privately questioned Biden’s ability to lead, the White House rejected the notion they needed reassurance from the president.

“We’re not picking up any signs of that from our allies at all. Quite the contrary. The conversations that we’re having with them in advance is they’re excited about this summit,” White House national security communications adviser John Kirby said on Monday.

Ukraine’s road to membership

Hours before the start of the summit on Tuesday, a barrage of Russian missiles rained down on Ukraine, hitting multiple civilian targets — including a children’s hospital.

The attack — which left at least 37 people dead, according to Ukrainian officials — underscored the gravity of the conflict that has indirectly pitted NATO powers against Moscow’s aggression.

Before Monday’s strike on Ukraine, a senior Biden administration official said that the U.S. would announce new air defenses and military capabilities for the country, adding that the summit would send “a strong signal” to Russian President Vladimir Putin “that if he thinks he can outlast the coalition of countries supporting Ukraine, he’s dead wrong.”

While Zelenskyy has been pushing for additional air defense systems, he has been critical of NATO’s decision to avoid setting a timeline for Ukraine to join its ranks.

A major focus of the Washington summit is expected to be what members of the alliance have branded as Ukraine’s “bridge to membership” — a longer-term effort aimed at steadily moving the country on a path toward becoming a NATO member.

In line with this aim, the alliance is expected to announce additional steps to boost tactical cooperation and force development in the coming days and financial pledges, as well as a host of security agreements between Ukraine and individual NATO members, according to Biden administration officials.

A “Trump-proof” NATO?

Long before the presidential debate in June, NATO observers have been buzzing about efforts to ensure the alliance can stay the course through political headwinds churned up by changes in leadership.

While the alliance’s secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, is scheduled to step down this fall, much of the attention has been fixed on the U.S. election and what pundits describe as a race to “Trump-proof” the alliance, which the former president has repeatedly threatened to leave. (Trump also said in February he wouldn’t protect a NATO nation that didn’t contribute enough defense funds and, instead, he’d “encourage” Russia “to do whatever the hell they want.”)

“Arguably, despite Russia’s continued revanchism, the greatest challenge to NATO today comes from within the alliance — particularly rising populism and publics that continue to question the value of the alliances — rather than from adversaries abroad,” said Raphael S. Cohen, a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation.

He argues that addressing that challenge relies on individual members meeting NATO’s guidelines calling for each country to commit at least 2% of its GDP to defense spending — a target 23 of its 32 members are currently meeting.

“It could change not only many American perceptions of the value of NATO but also change European security — if not global security — for the better,” Cohen said.

But members of the administration who believe a second Trump term in office would do irrevocable harm to the alliance say there’s only so much that NATO can do to minimize the impact.

Multiple U.S. officials aligned with Biden told ABC News that although the summit isn’t shaping up to be the celebration of the president’s foreign policy accomplishments that they anticipated, they hope the summit will draw attention to how a Trump victory in November could damage America’s standing internationally.

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(WASHINGTON) — House Democrats on Tuesday will gather for a consequential day of closed-door meetings where the focus is expected to be largely on President Joe Biden’s viability as a candidate and the path for the party going forward.

House Democrats will huddle at the Democratic National Committee headquarters just steps from the U.S. Capitol at 9 a.m., according to notices obtained by ABC News.

In a sign of how sensitive the conversation is expected to be, lawmakers’ cellphones will be collected at the door, presumably to prevent real-time leaks about the private discussion.

Senate Democrats are set to hold their own conference meeting on Tuesday, which would mark the first time the senators have met since Biden’s poor debate performance against Donald Trump in late June that triggered panic among some in the party about his fitness to carry out the 2024 campaign and serve another four years.

The meetings come at a pivotal moment for Biden, as calls for him to step aside from the race mounted this past week even after he and the White House ramped up outreach to anxious Democrats as it went into damage control mode.

Biden defiantly pushed back on critics on Monday, first in a blunt letter to Democrats saying it’s time for such hand-wringing to end and then in a call to MSNBC’s Morning Joe in which he railed against “elites” challenging his capabilities.

“The bottom line is, we’re not going anywhere. I am not going anywhere!” Biden told MSNBC anchors Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski.

The question now is whether Democrats fall in line behind Biden or whether questions about his candidacy continue to grow with the Democratic National Convention just weeks away.

So far, six Democrats have publicly said they do not support Biden as the nominee: Reps. Adam Smith, Angie Craig, Seth Moulton, Lloyd Doggett, Mike Quigley and Raul Grijalva.

“Any candidate for the highest office in our nation has a strong burden to bear,” Smith said in a statement on Tuesday. “That candidate must be able to clearly, articulately, and strongly make his or her case to the American people. It is clear that President Biden is no longer able to meet this burden.”

Several other senior House Democrats, besides Smith, privately told House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Sunday that they’re calling on Biden to exit the race, according to several sources with knowledge of the discussion. Jeffries did not express a position and said he would engage with the caucus throughout the week, according to one person on the call.

Biden on Monday met with Congressional Black Caucus virtually, two sources told ABC News. Black voters helped propel Biden to the White House in 2020 and are a critical voting bloc again in 2024. So far, no member of the Congressional Black Caucus has called on the president to step aside.

No Democratic senator has publicly called on Biden to withdraw from the race, but concerns have been raised by Sen. Mark Warner. Warner, who chairs the influential Senate Intelligence Committee, tried to assemble a group of Senate Democrats to discuss Biden’s path forward as early as Monday but the meeting didn’t take place.

Warner, in a statement on Tuesday, said “now is the time for conversations about the strongest path forward” given what is at stake in the November election.

“As these conversations continue, I believe it is incumbent upon the President to more aggressively make his case to the American people, and to hear directly from a broader group of voices about how to best prevent Trump’s lawlessness from returning to the White House,” Warner said.

Montana Sen. Jon Tester, one of the most vulnerable Senate Democrats up this cycle, similarly said that Biden needs to “prove” to him and voters that he’s up to the job.

Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Manchin, who became an independent earlier this year but still caucuses with Democrats, urged his colleagues to see how the coming days unfold before determining Biden’s future.

“The president has set a course of where he wants to go,” Manchin told ABC News Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott. “I think he has earned that right and he has a heck of a legacy right now with all the service he has. And just give it time.”

Manchin told reporters he believes the race is “winnable” for Biden.

“I have always said Trump is a threat to democracy,” he said. “You can’t call the race now. I mean, this is ridiculous. It’s early for people to get so excited. The bottom line is just wait until this week.”

This week, Biden will also be tested on the world stage as he hosts dozens of leaders in Washington for the 2024 NATO summit amid reports claiming U.S. allies have privately questioned his ability to lead.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Republican National Committee’s platform committee adopted a new GOP platform on Monday — and it softens language on the issue of abortion, marking a shift in the party’s stance to more closely align with the views of former President Donald Trump.

The platform says that Republicans “will oppose Late Term Abortion while supporting mothers and policies that advance Prenatal Care, access to Birth Control, and IVF (fertility treatments),” according to the document obtained by ABC News.

The 2024’s brief section on abortion also states that the GOP “believes” that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution “guarantees that no person can be denied Life or Liberty without Due Process and that the States are, therefore, free to pass Laws protecting those Rights” — bolstering Trump’s view that the issue should be determined at the state level. That’s a change from the GOP’s 2016 and 2020 platforms that supported legislation that would have imposed a 20-week federal abortion ban — language that Trump ran on both cycles.

Full RNC membership will vote to officially confirm the platform from the convention floor, according to an RNC spokesperson. The party’s convention takes place next week in Milwaukee. Trump dialed into the meeting Monday morning and “described why some parts are in” the platform, according to the committee member. During the meeting, Trump also expressed his approval of a draft of the new Republican Party platform, according to a source familiar with the meeting.

Trump took a victory lap after the platform committee voted to approve a new overhauled party platform plan to better align with his political posture.

“Ours is a forward-looking Agenda with strong promises that we will accomplish very quickly when we win the White House and Republican Majorities in the House and Senate. We are, quite simply, the Party of Common Sense! America needs determined Republican Leadership at every level of Government to address the core threats to our very survival,” Trump wrote on his social media platform.

The platform’s mention of abortion, however, came near the end of the full document. It is not included as part of the platform’s 20 principles that are prioritized first in the language. The first two of those principals call to “seal the border” and “carry out the largest deportation operation in American history.” Those are followed by “end inflation” and “make America the dominant energy producer in the world.” Notably, the U.S. is already the top global oil producer.

Other points include “large tax cuts for workers and no tax on tips,” “defend our constitution,” “prevent World War III” by restoring peace in Europe and the Middle East and putting an end to “weaponization” of the government.

A political party’s platform distinctly outlines its positions on foreign and domestic policies, but it is not binding and doesn’t directly impact the work of elected officials or candidates.

Monday’s move by the committee comes as abortion remains a key issue for voters in an election year in what is expected to be a close race between Trump and President Joe Biden.

In 2016, the Republican Party — on their way to nominating Trump for the first time — adopted a strict, conservative platform around issues of gender and sexual orientation against the efforts by some of the party’s more moderate faction to soften that language. An identical platform was approved in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic made it difficult for party committees to convene and adjust language. During that convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, Trump was chosen as the party’s nominee for a second time.

The Republican platform since the 1980s has articulated support for a constitutional amendment that would assert the sanctity and protection of human life, extending to unborn children. This is the first time in 40 years that the RNC has not explicitly endorsed a national ban on abortion in the platform.

Now, in 2024, the GOP will work to finalize a platform for the first time since the Dobbs decision overturned the constitutional right to an abortion more than two years ago. The plan could play an outsized role in establishing the ideals of a party reinvented by the former president, who has been clear about his opposition to a federal ban and his preference for this issue to be left up to the states.

Trump’s position on reproductive rights has worried some anti-abortion activists and RNC members who have expressed concern that the call for a “right to life” amendment would be stripped from the platform this year.

A platform committee member who spoke with ABC News following the vote, which passed 84-14, said there was a lot of “unanimity” around the language, even from some of the more socially conservative members who have been vocally opposing a platform reflective of Trump’s abortion stances.

“We had a whole bunch of people stand up and go the microphone [during a comment section]. And for the most part, things were really quite upbeat. People were happy to see this document,” the member said.

Following the vote, SBA Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser — a major anti-abortion leader and one of the individuals lobbying the Trump team about the platform this year — released a statement supporting the document.

“It is important that the GOP reaffirmed its commitment to protect unborn life today through the 14th Amendment. Under this amendment, Congress enacts and enforces its provisions. The Republican Party remains strongly pro-life at the national level. The mission of the pro-life movement, for the next six months, must be to defeat the Biden-Harris extreme abortion agenda,” Dannenfelser wrote.

“The platform allows us to provide the winning message to 10 million voters, with four million visits at the door in key battleground states,” Dannenfelser added.

But others, including Gayle Ruzicka, a Republican National Committee platform member from Utah, told ABC affiliate WISN-TV that she was disappointed with how the platform vote was “forced” on committee members and with how it handled abortion.

“I’m extremely disappointed that we do not have any pro-life language. There are good things in this platform. … This is the first time we don’t have a pro-life platform. The platform simply says that we oppose late-term abortion. Well, what about before that?” Ruzicka said.

At a political event in Waukesha, Wisconsin, following the vote on Monday afternoon, RNC Chairman Michael Whatley dispelled notions that the platform was weak on the issue of abortion.

“We have a very solid pro-life platform. We feel very, very solid about it. I think you can just look at the number of pro-life groups from across the country that have come in and said that they strongly support this platform. Look, the Republican Party stands for life. And we are always going to stand for life. I think when you look at this platform, you’re going to see that it is very pro-America. It is very pro-family. It is very pro-life. And we feel very strong about the language that we have,” Whatley said.

The Biden campaign responded to the GOP platform’s softened language on abortion by reinforcing their stance that Trump, should he regain the presidency, would not be moderate on the issue.

“Despite Trump and his team’s best efforts, the American people are clear on just how far he would go to rip away their freedoms – and they’ll vote accordingly this November,” Biden-Harris 2024 Spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said in a statement.

“Donald Trump has made it clear with his own words and actions what he will do if he regains power – rip away women’s freedoms, punish women, and ban abortion nationwide. You don’t have to take it from us, take it from Trump himself: He’s ‘proud’ to have ‘killed’ Roe v. Wade and unleashed extreme bans with no exceptions for rape or incest, which he calls ‘a beautiful thing to watch.’ He promised to be ‘leading the charge’ to ban abortion nationwide, and said he’d fight ‘side by side’ with extremists who want to ban abortion entirely. Trump himself said that women should be punished for having an abortion, that doctors should be criminalized for doing their jobs, and that he’s ‘looking at’ restrictions on birth control,” she added.

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(WASHINGTON) — During a virtual meeting with the Congressional Black Caucus Monday night, President Joe Biden thanked members and asked for their continued support, according to two people on the call who spoke to ABC News.

“I need you; I’m not going to disappoint you, I promise you,” the president told the members, one of the call participants said.

ABC News can first report that three Black Democratic senators also joined the call.

Two sources tell ABC News that Sens. Laphonza Butler, Cory Booker and Raphael Warnock also joined President Biden’s call with the Congressional Black Caucus. This is notable as the president looks to shore up support among black voters, the bedrock of the Democratic party.

The president told members that he was staying in the race. He thanked them for having “his back” and vowed to continue to have theirs. One person described the call as a “family conversation.”

While the president did take questions, two people on the call said no one expressed concerns about the president’s campaign or spoke out against him.

The call comes amid concerns over Biden staying in the race were raised privately and publicly by other House Democrats, including senior members of the party, following the debate.

So far, no Black Congressional Democrat has called on the president to step aside. And there’s an immense effort underway to make sure the CBC holds the line, according to two members of the CBC.

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