Boy Are Big Time Democratic Donors Pissed Off at Joe Biden

No one ever likes to get in trouble with their boss, and the Democratic Party is currently struggling through a tug-of-war with its string pullers. Unfortunately for the cloistered circle of sycophants who have carefully managed the president around his battles with Father Time, their donor class also have televisions and working sets of eyes and ears, and there is a massive panic spreading amongst the most powerful people in America’s only supposed good political party.

The litany of leaks emanating from Beltway media is fast and furious, and it is clear that the Democratic donor class is fuming, feeling blindsided by last week’s debate proving what most of America already believes.

Like a lot of people over 80 years old, Joe Biden slows down towards the end of the day, so his staff have concentrated his event schedule during his most lucid hours before 4 pm, and have tried to avoid settings they do not have control over, as demonstrated by Biden holding the presidential record for fewest press conferences ever. His staff has tightly restricted access to him, so there are very few people in this world who have had an unfiltered view of President Biden.

Axios reports that to the people who have seen unvarnished images of him, Biden’s degradation has been quite noticeable compared to when he was inaugurated, suggesting the debate was not a “bad night” as many in Bidenworld are spinning it.

Democrats tell us privately that there’s a perceptible increase in the number of times today, versus three years ago, where the signs of old age show. Hence their concern that this will only get worse.

Not to do the Dril you have to give it to ISIS meme, but if you are cutting million-dollar checks to definitely not buy political influence, it is understandable to be upset after turning on your TV and seeing your money going towards Grandpa Simpson. It’s no surprise that some donors queried whether they could get their money back, in any, you know, hypothetical situation. I know that this paragraph has sarcasm font all over it but check out that first link, part of this bit is most certainly real, as NBC reported after Biden’s campaign manager had a call with top donors:

“There were some tough comments from those on the call. Some were upset that they are just hearing campaign talking points,” the participant said, adding that some donors even asked about having their contributions refunded.

Whitney Tilson, another major Democratic donor, sent a long e-mail to “28 Democrats – 12 Senators, 15 House members and one governor (Wes Moore)” containing this passage:

“I will fight to my dying breath to stop Trump and his toxic Trumpism, but if the man I saw at the debate is the real Joe Biden right now, then it would be a waste of my time and money to support him because he has almost no chance of beating Trump.”

This one…man. What the hell is the Democratic Party even doing right now? The election is in four months! Per Politico:

One adviser to major Democratic Party donors said they were texting from a meeting of donors in Atlanta on Thursday night, some writing “wtf.”

“Our only hope is that he bows out, we have a brokered convention, or dies,” the donor adviser said. “Otherwise we are fucking dead.”

From that same report, another donor is going full galaxy-brain and getting lost in a Wes Moore and Gretchen Whitmer fantasy-land.

One major Democratic donor and Biden supporter said it was time for the president to end his campaign. This person described Biden’s night as “the worst performance in history” and said Biden was so “bad that no one will pay attention to Trump’s lies.”

“Biden needs to drop out. No question about it,” the donor said in a text message, proposing an alternate ticket led by the governors of Maryland and Michigan.

CNN reports that there are three wings of Biden donors: Biden defenders, “middle-of-the-road approach” types who want to wait and see what the fallout looks like, and those who want him gone yesterday. The last group has the fewest ties to Bidenworld and thus the least amount of influence, and so as far as the president is likely concerned, his defenders and the data are the most important determinants as to whether the Party’s real power brokers will execute a coup that roughly three quarters of the country is begging them to do. I opened with the rage on the anti-Biden side, here is what the cope looks like opposing it from another anonymous donor.

“I don’t think (Biden) is going anywhere,” the donor told CNN. “This is the old horse we’ve got, and we need to ride him ‘til he’s ready for the glue factory.”

The glue factory viewpoint seems to represent a slice of resigned Biden supporter, as Politico reported:

Another adviser said they had “taken no less than half a dozen key donors texting ‘disaster’ and [the] party needs to do something,” but acknowledged that “not much is possible unless” Biden steps aside.

In the aforementioned CNN article, they reported on a fundraiser over the weekend at hedge fund manager Barry Rosenstein’s East Hampton, New York mansion, where donor Charles Meyers provided an example of the denial that some Biden defenders are going through.

The gathering in Midtown, [Meyers] added, saw Biden in “great form,” and he had a “general sense” that while the debate “was really bad … the campaign is doing a course correction and all of us want to double the effort to help with that turnaround.”

What makes this a disaster is not that it is a surprise to the general public, but a confirmation. It doesn’t matter how good Biden looks between the hours of 10 am and 4 pm going forward. The Biden campaign is pointing to polls which demonstrate not much movement against him yet, and that would not be a surprise if that wound up being the result of this mess. People already saw Biden as the old guy in this race he is currently losing, and that image is now fossilized in voter’s minds. A CBS poll in June found 65% of registered voters do not believe Biden has the mental and cognitive health to serve as president, which rose to 72% after last week’s debate.

There’s just not a whole lot of people left to convince that he’s too old for the job.

The final group, and perhaps the most influential should the data shift in any significant way against Biden, are the middle-of-the-road types who want to see what kind of an effect this has on polling in the coming weeks, as NBC reported on this style of view in the Party:

Another senior Democratic official who has spoken directly with Biden and members of his campaign team said he has been reassured about Biden’s staying in the race and characterized his team’s posture as “powering through.”

But he also said he has had a lot of “one-off texts and conversations” with his peers and predicted the next two weeks would be critical.

“We’ll have polls and we’ll have a money count. If they’re good, it leans that he [remains in the race]. And if it’s not, all bets are off,” the official said. It will be “decided on data more than emotion. It’s too early to make the call.”

Biden’s upside is capped. That’s the disastrous takeaway from this debate. I detailed two weeks ago how Nebraska contains a portal to hell where Trump and Biden tie, and that seems increasingly likely should this election wind up in the range of scenarios where the Democrats over-perform their polls.

Current polling makes it look as if a tie requires just two sets of outcomes given that this election will likely be decided by six states and one city. First, that Biden lose Georgia, Nevada and Arizona, where polling averages have him roughly five points behind in all three states. Next, he would need to win the famed Midwest firewall in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, where the president is only behind by a point or two or less. That would leave the fate of the universe in Omaha’s hands, which is more or less a coin flip, as Nebraska’s second district would determine whether the electoral college finished 269-269 or 270-268 for Biden.

The latter is looking more and more like Biden’s best-case scenario as he loses ground in Georgia, Nevada and Arizona. After living through a Democratic Supreme Court Justice and the Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee staying in office well beyond their body’s expiration date and betraying their own advancements, Biden trying to repeat recent history yet again is proof of an eternal maxim that Democratic donors should know by now: you get what you pay for.