Democrats can't escape questions about Biden despite cancer diagnosis

The Hill

20-05-2025

Former President Biden's cancer diagnosis has done little to quell concerns about his decision to run for reelection, and many in the party acknowledge the issue is likely to dog them as they look toward 2028.
The announcement on Sunday that Biden had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer came as Democrats have been reckoning with renewed concerns over his mental acuity and whether he should have dropped out of the presidential race sooner last year.
While the news of Biden's illness was met with an outpouring of condolences from both sides of the aisle, it also sparked new questions surrounding the Biden team's handling of his health and underscored the degree to which scrutiny over the former president will persist through the next White House election.
'I think Democrats, whoever they are, need to be ready for this question,' Democratic strategist Maria Cardona said of attention on Biden's 2024 decisions.
But, especially in light of the former president's diagnosis, 'it does the Democratic Party, nor the American people, nor the country we're fighting for, any good for us to dwell on this,' Cardona said. 'So let's answer the question, and let's move on.'
Prior to the announcement, several top Democrats seen as potential 2028 hopefuls were hit with questions about the end of Biden's presidency, with many of them coming closer to acknowledging Biden's weaknesses than most prominent Democrats had in the past.
Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told an Iowa town hall that his then-boss's decision to run for reelection 'maybe' hurt Democrats last year, though he encouraged the party not 'to wallow in hindsight.' Asked whether Biden experienced cognitive decline in office, Buttigieg said that 'every time I needed something from him and from the West Wing, I got it.'
Taking a sharper stance on the acuity question, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) told Politico that there's 'no doubt' Biden suffered cognitive decline and contended it was 'self-evident' that Biden not running would have been better for the party.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) also told CNN last week that talk of Biden's health is 'backward-looking,' but conceded that Biden should have either remained the 2024 nominee or dropped out before the primaries.
'To rebuild trust, Democrats must be honest. In light of the facts that have come out, Joe Biden should not have run for reelection, and we should have had an open primary,' said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), another Democrat who has spurred 2028 chatter, in a post on X last week.
The questions came as revelations from new books have painted a bleak picture of the end of Biden's term.
In 'FIGHT: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House,' The Hill's Amie Parnes and NBC News's Jonathan Allen reported that Democratic Party officials and White House staffers were well aware of Biden's frailties, taking steps to hide signs of aging and make contingency plans.
Excerpts from 'Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,' a new book from CNN's Jake Tapper and Axios's Alex Thompson, spotlight similar efforts, including scripted Cabinet meetings and multiple cameras to cover flubs.
'The people who wrote those books were not in the White House with us,' former first lady Jill Biden said in an appearance last week on 'The View,' where the Bidens pushed back against concerns stemming from the books.
'Original Sin' published on Tuesday, just days after Biden's team announced his diagnosis.
Former Obama strategist David Axelrod, who was one of the earliest Democratic voices raising concerns about Biden's health ahead of 2024, said on Sunday that the diagnosis should tamp down discussions about the end of Biden's term, though he acknowledged that the scrutiny is likely to persist with the release of 'Original Sin.'
'I think those conversations are going to happen, but they should be more muted and set aside for now as he's struggling through this,' Axelrod said on CNN.
Michael Ceraso, a Democratic strategist who's worked on four presidential campaigns, disagreed with Axelrod's call.
'If there are stories, and there have been stories, about any type of health being concealed … I think we should be talking about: What does that look like, when it comes to our relationship between the presidency and the voters?' Ceraso said.
'What happened with Biden, if his team did what has been accused of them of doing, this is a legit conversation no different, in my mind, than if you're saying, 'well, Trump is spewing misinformation,' and you're fact checking the president,' he added.
Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.), who initially challenged Biden for the nomination last year, suggested the cancer announcement was timed purposefully to deflect criticism of the former president.
'I don't think it's coincidental that this was announced this week,' Phillips told The New York Times in an interview published Monday.
Figures on the right were quick to raise new suspicions about Biden following his diagnosis.
'Whether the right time to have this conversation is now or at some point in the future, we really do need to be honest about whether the former president was capable of doing the job,' Vice President Vance said, as he offered wishes for recovery.
Remarks from Vance and others signal that Republicans will continue to hammer Democrats over Biden, keeping the issue at the fore for potential 2028 leaders.
'It'll be a question about who was lying, and when were they lying, and how significant was the lie,' said Democratic strategist Hank Sheinkopf.
'The Trump forces within the Republican Party … their move is to go after the Democrats for being untruthful, for lying and putting the nation at risk with a president who was potentially not capable of doing the job.'
Across the aisle, Democrats 'universally are sad' about the former president's health, said Matt Bennett of the center-left think tank Third Way, and that's served to 'mitigate some of the anger' from the books and his return to the spotlight.
Lingering questions may put some candidates, especially those closer to the former president, in a 'slightly awkward spot,' but 2024 questions are not likely to be 'campaign-defining,' argued Bennett, who worked on Bill Clinton's campaigns.
The news of Biden's diagnosis did 'sort of blunt the release' of Tapper and Thompson's much-awaited book, said Democratic commentator Kaivan Shroff. 'Of course, I do think people are allowed to ask questions about the timing and all of those things.'
'Absolutely, this is going to be a story that comes back, and people are going to want to know: What did you know? When did you know it? Why didn't you know it sooner?' Shroff said.
'I think what Democrats need to be able to do is, when this comes up … focus it back on Donald Trump, who's currently leading the country.'