After US President Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential race, Republicans have called en masse for his immediate resignation. They argued that if he cannot run for re-election, he should not continue to govern.
The Republican leadership in Congress, along with influential figures within the party, outlined on Sunday their attack strategy against Vice President Kamala Harris, whom Biden has already given his support as the new Democratic candidate for the November elections.
Conservatives accused Harris of covering up Biden’s “mental decline” and blamed her for U.S. immigration policy, calling it a “disaster.”
Led by House Speaker Mike Johnson, several Republican heavyweights on Capitol Hill expressed their desire to see Biden out of office, saying that if he is unable to run for re-election, he cannot govern the country either.
“If Joe Biden is unfit to run for President, he is unfit to serve as President. He must resign from office immediately,” Johnson wrote on his account on the X platform, where he also directly attacked Harris.
“As second in command, she has been a happy accomplice to the biggest cover-up in American history. She knew, as did everyone, that (Biden) was unfit” to be president, the lawmaker added.
At this unprecedented juncture in American history, we must be clear about what just happened. The Democrat Party forced the Democrat nominee off the ballot, just over 100 days before the election.
Having invalidated the votes of more than 14 million Americans who selected Joe…
— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) July 21, 2024
House Republican No. 2 Steve Scalise added that all Biden administration employees must be held accountable.
“Democrats have for years smeared Americans who questioned Biden’s health. Every single person who participated in this cover-up operation, especially Vice President Harris, must be held accountable,” Scalise said.
Democrat party bosses just proved that they have absolutely no respect for their own voters. After reading others about democracy, they just forced Joe Biden off the ticket—trashing the primary choice of 14 million of their own voters.
For years, Democrats and their partners…
— Steve Scalise (@SteveScalise) July 21, 2024
Elise Stefanik, chairwoman of the Republican Conference, the organization that represents members of the party in the House of Representatives, also demanded Biden’s immediate resignation. “The Democratic Party is in free fall because of their desperate attempt to cover up that Biden is not well,” she said.
Tomorrow I am introducing a resolution condemning Kamala Harris’ role as Joe Biden’s “Border czar” leading to the most catastrophic open border crisis in history.
Biden’s open border czar Kamala Harris and every elected Democrat owns this border crisis.
— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) July 21, 2024
The only Republican leader in Congress who did not echo this idea was Mitch McConnell, the conservative minority leader in the Senate, who has maintained a close relationship with Biden throughout his career.
In a statement, McConnell criticized Democrats for their attempts to remove Biden from the nomination.
“Sadly, the Democratic Party has been busy over the past few weeks trying to undo the will of the American people in primary elections across the country,” wrote McConnell, who, at 82, has announced his retirement from Congress.
For four years, the American people have faced historic inflation at home, chaos at the border, and weak leadership abroad. Our nation is less prosperous and less secure than it was in January, 2021. We cannot afford four more years of failure.
Full statement:…
— Leader McConnell (@LeaderMcConnell) July 21, 2024
Senator JD Vance, vice presidential running mate to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, joined in the criticism, accusing Harris of being part of America’s “worst presidency.”
“For the past four years, she supported Biden’s open borders policy. She owns all the failures and lied for almost four years about Biden’s mental capacity,” he wrote on X.
Joe Biden has been the worst President in my lifetime and Kamala Harris has been right there with him every step of the way. Over the last four years she co-signed Biden’s open border and green scam policies that drove up the cost of housing and groceries. She owns all of these…
— JD Vance (@JDVance1) July 21, 2024
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, an influential figure within the Republican Party, directly criticized Harris for the Biden administration’s handling of immigration, calling her the “border enforcer.”
If Biden is unfit to run FOR the presidency, he is unfit to run THE presidency.
American security is at risk both at home and abroad.
A change in the oval office is essential – immediately – to ensure the safety of Americans and the security of our country.
— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) July 21, 2024
Shortly after taking office in 2021, Joe Biden tasked Kamala Harris with “addressing the root causes” of migration, focusing specifically on Central America and the countries of the so-called Northern Triangle.
In a letter published Sunday in X, Biden, 81, announced his withdrawal from the presidential race, after days of speculation and pressure from members of his own party.
Keep reading:
• Kamala Harris hopes to win the Democratic nomination and “defeat Donald Trump”
• Keys to understanding the process of replacing Biden as a candidate
• Donald Trump reacted to Joe Biden’s resignation from his re-election: “He was not fit to be president”