Late-night hosts talked Democrats’ closed-door meeting to discuss Joe Biden’s campaign and Biden’s attempts to assuage concerns at a Nato summit.
Seth Meyers
Seth Meyers opened his Wednesday Closer Look segment with a reminder of just what is at stake in the 2024 election, especially the “terrifying” rightwing agenda known as Project 2025. “The entirety of the far-right establishment is committed to enacting it and filling Trump’s administration with zealots and loyalists who will be hellbent on pursuing it,” the Late Night host explained. “And that’s why Democrats desperately need the strongest possible, unified effort to stop it.”
“Instead, they all seem to be commiserating over how bad things are going for them” after Biden’s disastrous debate performance. On Tuesday, Senate Democrats attended a closed-door meeting to discuss Biden’s campaign chances that one participant described as “like a funeral”.
Meyers didn’t have patience for the melancholy. “Oh my God, Democrats, get your shit together!” he urged. “There’s still four months left to go and you’re already admitting defeat and holding a funeral? This is like a football giving a half-time speech that ends in ‘clear eyes, full hearts, we’re gonna get crushed!’
“Don’t just mope around, do something!” he continued. “If you think Biden should step aside, then tell him to get out and start the process of replacement. If you think he should stay in, then get to work and right the ship now! But this melancholy, handwringing, woe is me bullshit is so exhausting. No one cares how sad you guys are. Democracy is on the line. A pathological, megalomaniac is currently leading in the polls, and if he wins, you won’t be able to distract yourself by looking at porn because it will be banned.”
Regardless of whether you think Biden should or should not continue his campaign, Meyers added: “Democrats don’t seem to be treating this situation with the urgency it requires.”
Meyers pointed to the former House speaker Nancy Pelosi, who when asked whether she would continue to support Biden, said: “I want him to do whatever he decides to do.”
“You guys are talking about him the way disappointed parents talk about a college student’s major,” Meyers said. “‘I mean, I wish he was pre-med, but he fell in love with improv and it’s my job as a parent to say yes, and!’”
“Anyone who recognizes the dangers of a second Trump term must acknowledge two things: first, Joe Biden is polling worse at this stage in the race than any Democratic presidential candidate in years and the debate only made thing worse,” said Meyers. “But second and more important, there’s still time to turn things around.”
Meyers pointed to France, where the left rallied to defeat the far right in a runoff election just a week after the far right emerged ahead in the first round of voting. “As France just proved, there’s still time to regroup and beat back the far right,” Meyers concluded. “Democrats should take a cue from them and do the same.”
Stephen Colbert
On the Late Show, Stephen Colbert recapped Biden’s attempt to restore confidence in his campaign with a speech at a Nato summit. “He nailed the speech,” Colbert said, reconfirming the US commitment to Nato “with gusto”.
Without incident or pauses, Biden declared: “Here at this summit we gather to proclaim Nato is ready and able to secure that vision today and well into the future.”
“That’s the Joe I know! That’s the man!” Colbert cheered, before recognizing an opportunity: “Let’s hold the election right now, OK? Any loose paper near you is officially a ballot. Or just grab a hunk of birch bark near you and sign your name, slip it through a window of the closest elementary school or just anything near a bake sale. Legally, they have to take it.”
Biden’s campaign faces a confidence crisis, but “until something changes, many Democrats are speaking up by saying nothing”, said Colbert, teeing up clips of Democratic lawmakers refusing to acknowledge the question of whether they would continue to support Biden as the Democratic nominee.
“Here’s the thing: maybe Biden can’t win, or maybe he is the only one who can win. I don’t know what the right answer is, and I’m not alone,” said Colbert. One Democratic rep, when asked if Democrats were on the same page after Tuesday’s closed-door meeting, said: “We’re not even in the same book.”
One person who has turned is actor and Democratic donor George Clooney, who authored a New York Times op-ed titled “I love Joe Biden. But we need a new nominee.”
“Adding ‘we also need a money guy, a safe cracker, an acrobat and Brad Pitt,’” Colbert joked. “It’s the plot of Ocean’s 24: Amal’s Busy with Human Rights Stuff and I Got Bored.”
