Ashley Judd, an actress, is joining the calls for President Joe Biden to drop out of the race for president after how he did in last month’s debate. She says she is afraid he will lose to Republican Donald Trump in November.
That same day, Judd wrote an opinion piece for USA Today in which he asked Biden to “voluntarily, gracefully step aside” so that his party could back a “talented, robust Democrat” for president. She said of Biden during the debate that he was “unable to counter Trump while he, unchecked, gushed a firehose of irritating lies.”
Judd, who has been a vocal supporter of Biden and other Democrats across the country, talked about how her political work has gone hand-in-hand with her long career in Hollywood. Making these claims about movie mogul Harvey Weinstein helped start the #MeToo movement.
If voters choose to keep Trump in office, Judd said she fears he will “use the power of the presidency with unprecedented, unimaginable cruelty and unfairness.” She also said that Democrats need to quickly replace Biden with a candidate who can beat Trump.
She said, “We don’t have another day to be distracted or fight with each other.”
Judd didn’t suggest anyone else as a possible replacement for Biden at the top of the ticket, and a representative didn’t answer right away when asked about her ideas.
Concerns about Biden’s age and ability to beat Trump in the general election have made Democrats think twice about whether they want him to stay as his party’s nominee. This is why she made her call.
That same week, George Clooney, a movie star who has always been a Democrat, wrote in the New York Times that he loves Joe Biden, but that the party would lose the presidential race and every race in Congress with him as the nominee. During conversations about a fundraiser in Los Angeles last month, he talked about what he called a “lesser Biden.”
In April, Judd was at the White House to help the Biden administration promote its new national strategy to stop suicide. In 2022, her mother, singer Naomi Judd, died by suicide. When asked for a comment on Ashley Judd’s piece, the Biden campaign did not respond right away.
