Joe Biden’s Biggest Donors Abandon Him

A number of Democratic donors have withdrawn their support of President Joe Biden as he continues to receive criticism over his performance in this election cycle’s first presidential debate.

On June 27, Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, met his Republican counterpart, Donald Trump, in Atlanta to discuss issues important to American voters. During the debate, Biden gave a series of incoherent and confusing responses and at times appeared to trail off without finishing his sentences.

The president has since been lambasted by dissenters, with calls for him to end his reelection bid and allow the Democratic Party to select a new candidate to take on Trump. His odds of victory in the general election also slumped, according to bookmakers.

Now, donors integral to funding his campaign are turning against the Democrat. George Conway, an attorney who previously donated $929,600 to the Biden Victory Fund, the maximum amount permissible, said both Biden and Trump should retire.

“As I’m sure many of you have, I’ve been thinking a lot about the electoral choice we have in [2024] with more focus over the past few days, and I keep returning to a conclusion I reached a while back, but felt was not realistic enough as a scenario to be worth expressing,” Conway wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

“And that is that, for the good of the country and their own good, both of the major-party presidential candidates should retire,” he added.

Newsweek contacted Biden’s campaign for comment by email outside office hours.

While speaking at the Aspen Institute’s Ideas Festival on Friday, Ari Emanuel, a Democratic megadonor and Hollywood agent, suggested more donors would turn against the candidate.

“The lifeblood to a campaign in politics, the lifeblood is money,” Emanuel said. “And maybe the only way this gets—with smart lawyers looking at it—is if the money starts drying up. And I’ve talked—I mean, I’m assuming all of you’ve gotten a lot of calls. I’ve gotten a lot of calls. We’ve all sat there.”

“But if this is, as Biden says, the fight for our democracy … man, he gave us a bunch of malarkey, and I’m really pissed. We all should be really pissed,” he continued.

“You’re gonna see polling in the next couple of weeks if the money comes in. I’ve talked to a bunch of big donors, and they’re moving all their money to Congress and the Senate. I mean, I cannot believe we’re in this situation,” Emanuel said, adding: “It’s a legal issue now. You’re not in ‘I’m gonna resign,’ you know, unless the lawyers tell you something else and maybe there’s some wiggle room. I haven’t seen it, and I’m not a lawyer. But we’re in f— city.”

Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings and his wife, Patty Quillin—who gave more than $1.5 million to Biden during his 2020 presidential race, the New York Times reported—also spoke out against the president.

“Biden needs to step aside to allow a vigorous Democratic leader to beat Trump and keep us safe and prosperous,” Hastings said in an email to the Times. Newsweek has not obtained a copy of this email to verify its contents.

Speaking to Newsweek, Christopher Phelps, a professor of modern American history at the University of Nottingham in the U.K., said some donors may move away from Biden if his “poll numbers fall off a cliff.”

“There are two kinds of campaign finance donors,” Phelps said. “The first is partisan or ideological. They care ardently about a Democratic victory on grounds of abortion and LGBTQ rights, democracy, the environment, and other specific causes. The second might be called partisan—big corporate lobbyists, for example, who make donations to gain access. If Biden’s poll numbers fall off a cliff, the second will stop giving. They only want to be on train rides to victory. But there’s a chance the first group, desperate to stop Trump, only rallies more to Biden’s side. And that group can include both small donations and the ‘donor class.'”

He added: “There are signs that the big-money donors are really, really worried, though, and if they feel gaslighted by a campaign that is pretending Biden is fine—there’s no problem, only ‘bed wetters’ are nervous—then they may feel insulted and patronized and decide to stop giving.”