In a story headlined “Democrats Splinter Over Israel as the Young, Diverse Left Rages at Biden,” the New York Times reports: “The Democratic Party’s yearslong unity behind President Biden is beginning to erode over his steadfast support of Israel in its escalating war with the Palestinians, with a left-leaning coalition of young voters and people of color showing more discontent toward him than at any point since he was elected.”
The news article points out that Biden “faces new resistance from an energized faction of his party that views the Palestinian cause as an extension of the racial and social justice movements that dominated American politics in the summer of 2020.”
Meanwhile, the Times notes, “Biden is already struggling with low Democratic enthusiasm, and it would not take much of a slip in support from voters who backed him in 2020 to throw his re-election bid into question. His margin of victory in key battleground states was just a few thousand votes — hardly enough to spare a significant drop-off from young voters alienated by his loyalty to a right-wing Israeli government they see as hostile to their values.”
Biden’s re-election bid is especially vulnerable in Michigan, where support has eroded this month among the state’s large Arab American and Muslim population.
The Step Aside Joe campaign has released a statement renewing its call for Biden to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race. “Since the heinous October 7th attack on Israel by Hamas,” the statement says, “President Biden has been a vocal backer of Israel’s ‘right’ to wage a horrific bombing campaign on the people of Gaza in the name of ‘self-defense.’ Meanwhile, 66 percent of the U.S. voting public and 80 percent of Democrats have told pollsters they want the U.S. government to ‘call for a ceasefire and a de-escalation of violence in Gaza.’ Biden’s failure to call for a ceasefire reflects that he is badly out of step with public opinion.”
Available for interviews:
JEFF COHEN, jeff@rootsaction.org, @Roots_Action
Cohen is co-founder of RootsAction.org, which is sponsoring the Step Aside Joe campaign. He is a retired journalism professor at Ithaca College and founder of the media watch group FAIR. Cohen was a Bernie Sanders delegate to the 2020 Democratic National Convention.