Biden Aides Believe Obama Is Plotting Joe’s Ouster After Clooney Op-Ed

Anna Conkling
·2 min read
Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

The Biden campaign believes that former President Barack Obama is working behind the scenes to oust President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough said.

“Joe Biden is deeply resentful of his treatment. Not only of the Obama staff but also the way he was pushed aside for Hillary Clinton... He’s always felt like an outsider, always felt like people look down upon him,” Scarborough said of Biden during Thursday morning’s episode of Morning Joe.

The comments come after Politico reported that actor George Clooney called Obama shortly before his bombshell op-ed in The New York Times calling on President Joe Biden to step aside was published.

The former president notably did not push back against Clooney’s call for his former vice president to drop out of the 2024 race against Donald Trump, Politico reported.

Obama attended the same glitzy Hollywood fundraiser where Clooney wrote that he noticed Biden’s decline.

The former president was one of the first major voices to defend Biden after his disastrous debate performance, which sparked the cascade of calls for his withdrawal.

George Clooney Tells Joe Biden: Quit to Save Democracy

“I love Joe Biden,” wrote Clooney. “As a senator. As a vice president and as president. I consider him a friend, and I believe in him. But the one battle he cannot win is the fight against time. None of us can.”

The actor added that Democrats “Are not going to win in November with this president.”

The op-ed came the same day as a searing viral post on X from former Obama speechwriter Jon Lovett, who wrote that though Biden has been an “extraordinary president,” “in the two weeks since the debate, it’s the arrogant and small Joe Biden we’ve seen most - hanging on, bragging, defensive, angry, weak.”

“Joe Biden can leave office as one of the greatest presidents in our lifetimes, who defeated Trump and put his country first at every turn; or he can leave a stubborn old man who allowed hubris and insecurity to destroy his legacy and perhaps our democracy with it,” Lovett added.

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