press conference i just did the nato thing i know what i am doing here. when i have an honest assessment with my family and friends i don't know if i will be the person that i will be the same in four years. logically separate issues. to your point, what i think we all agree on, everyone agrees on it can not continue. joe biden is a nominee and it is knocked down or something else will have to happen and happen soon. jen psaki, that is all in on thursday night. al e, good evening, alex. >> it is the one thing everyone can agree on. we can not live like this much longer as a nation, media, people in the world. yes, here are our pleas, anyone in power to change this. thank you, chris.

tonight, after a day in which biden saw more members of his party calling for him to drop out of the race the president capped the nato with a high stakes press conference to say that it was a major moment for president biden and his party is an understatement. biden's question and answer session was watched by america's allies and politicians of both parties and an audience here in the u.s. and around the globe. >> i am not handing in my -- having any of my european allies come up to me, joe, don't run, what i hear them say, you got to win, you can not let this guy come forward. it will be a disaster. it will be a disaster. i mean. i think he said at one of his rallies don't hold me to this, nato, i just learned about nato or something to that effect. foreign policy is never been

his strong point. he seems to have an a finnity affinity to them. no one thinks if he wins in ukraine that will be the end of it. what i can say i believe i am the best qualified person to do the job. >> almost as important as the content of the president's remarks was the delivery. energy, enthusiasm, command of details and policy. >> the fact is that the consideration is that i think i am the most qualified person to run for president, i beat him once, and i will beat him again. secondly. the idea -- i served in the senate for a long time -- the

idea that senators and congressman running for office worrying about the ticket is not unusual. and i might add, there were at least five president running or incumbent presidents who had lower numbers than i have now. later in the campaign. so, there is a long way to go in this campaign. and, so, i am just going to keep moving. keep moving, and because look, i got more work to do. we have more work to finish. there is so much, we made so much progress. >> the focus of this week's nato summit was supposed to be support of ukraine. a lot of ways it was, just indirectly. the conversations about nato funding will describe it in months. the fate of the global order as we know it could come down to

domestic american politics. here was ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy saying just that earlier this week. >> ladies and gentlemen, let me, and i want to be, cannedit candid and frank, now everyone is waiting for november. americans are waiting for november. and europe, middle east, in the pacific, the whole world is looking towards, looking to november, and truly speaking, putin, awaits november, too. >> putin awaits november. on this count putin may be right. the two presidential nominees has different worldviews that the 2024e flexion november could be the election in november could be decide figure western world stands up for democracy or lets it fall.

those are the stakes. not just acknowledged by zelenskyy but nato. the leaders of all of the nations are aligned in president biden in support for ukraine, one of them is not. hungry's autocrat. prime minister spent today in florida meeting with former president trump at his mar-a- lago resort. meet that comes just a week after prime minister became the first western leader to travel to moscow and visit with putin in more than two years. that meeting was so out of balance compared to where are the rest of europe stands on the issue that leaders of the eu and nato itself released statements making clear that orban in notice weigh represented their organizations with his visit. they distanced themselves from

orban and trump embraces him. this is maybe not all that surprising. victor orban, putin, trump, have a lot in common. in a decision to what amounts to a strong man fan boy club they are all members of. they are all intent on what defined the world order for the past 75 years. and, tonight, donald trump and victor orban had a powwow, planning for what they would do if trump regains power again after november. so yes, put sin waiting for november. so is zelenskyy, so is biden, so is the world. >> i will not bow down to putin. i will not walk away from ukraine. i will keep nato strong that is exactly what we did. exactly what we will continue to do. now, future of american policy

is up to the american people. much more of a political question, more than that, it is a national security issue. don't reduce this to the usual testament that people talk about issues of it being a political campaign. it is far too important. it is about the world we live in. for decades to come. joining me now is ben rodes, gentleman, you are three great people to hear from on a night like tonight. i want to hear from all of you your impressions of what unfolded how did president biden do? >> well, i think the press conference was miniature of what has been going on in nato for the last few days. president biden was very

focused on delivering a message about nato, america's commitment to the liberal order, our commitment to ukraine, he is obviously speaking about issues related to china, foreign policy issues that have been on the agenda the last couple of days. i also know that nato in the last couple of days the main topic of conversation outside of the formal meetings, the topic in the hallways and in the hotel bars, among foreign leaders and heard from people in foreign governments has been about the political crisis here in the democratic party and the question of what is going to happen in the election. same time he is delivering that message he is delivering with that political backdrop. some ways nato, alex t is like a democratic caucus meeting. everyone is saying things in public and private. holding their breathe in the press conference. coming out of that you still

feel like you are in the same place. command of issues and also, you know, reaffirm some of the concerns about vigorously you can prosecute the case against trump. we exit this summit in the kind of limbo that we entered it. >> yes. as white house national security spokesman i wonder how you lookedda the what unfolded. you know, we -- looked at what unfolded. i have not had any of my european allies say joe don't run, what i hear them say is you got to win. those two things are connected, right? what is your assessment about the fears held on to that. now i watched the press conference. no doubt in my mind that he is a foreign policy expert.

he knows his stuff. he also has a good story to tell when it comes to nato. 2019, the french president said that nato was brain dead and joe biden helped invigorate it. brought together the allies to support ukraine to get military into ukraine and push back against the russians. on the policy, substance, joe biden is in the right place and he knows his stuff. the concern i think from people like me and people who are worry about him winning it. does he have the compleuncasion skills and the ability to explain -- communication skills and ability explain himself. tonight was way better than the debate but i don't know if it was great in terms of making an argument against trump. >> what did you think when you looked -- you just did deep reporting about western europe and november and trump victory

is a foregone conclusion, how did you look at the press conference? >> i found myself thinking about the conversation that i had with european officials, europe, in nato headquarters this past spring. and the pattern was, in all of the conversations, we are terrified of trump being re- elected. we think it is more likely than not what it would mean for the world, destabilization of europe, for the war in ukraine it would be catastrophic. when we talked about joe biden, asked them about biden, they start by saying, you know. on, on experience, on policy, on his breath and depth of knowledge we admire him. he believes in nato, he believes in alliances and we love all of that. then they would often ask, now

can i talk to you anonymously. on background. why is he running, right? is he really the best that democrats to put forward? i think that news conference to me showcased the reasons for that. biden showed an ability to speak in great depth about these issues. certainly more than trump could. same time, the performance, dusts himself off, interrupts himself, loses his train of thought. he misspeaks and i think my guess it is not able to make contact with those people 20 minutes since the news conference ended but my guess is a lot of the officials that i spoke to in europe looked at that news conference and had their impressions about biden confirmed good, bad, and ugly. >> i take everything that you are saying in terms of characterizing the president's

posture but i also saw him a bit more defiance and combative than certainly in the debate where you would expect him to be. a couple times he leaned into and said sort of challenging the press and all of the detractures to come and find the ways in which he has not done a good job, show the receipts for a president that somehow weakened legislative and in terms of accomplishments. did you think that was effective? it feels like we are in a twilight zone where, you know, i am not sure that much changed one way or the other to me suggests biden stays in the race. i am unclear what else is going to happen here given the democratic party's admitted reluctance to keep the fight going on much longer. >> well, i think it was, again, a mixed bag in terms of the defiance you are talking about, alex. i thought as some of the work done on campaigns in addition

to foreign policy i thought he was effective when it was directed at trump or directed at, you know, corporations not paying their fair share. but frankly, when the defiance is directed at the media or it is very much about him and his accomplishments or it is about his own that is the question that people are asking. i hear from them as well, too, the questions they are asking are about, if he can win this election, if he has the stamina and skill set required right now to beat trump and if he can serve out another four years and if that defiance is at what he wants to do in the future and not just directed at what he has done in the past and defending at the nato summit. nobody doubts that was productive nato summit. that is not what we are

debating here. so, that is where i think in is a disconnect it is going after the detractures and arguing about the record over the last 3-1/2 years. flow one is questioning that. the question is about what is the best way to go forward from here. what nato reenforces is the stakes involved in that decision are not just the future of american democracy and american people's future but, literally the future of ukraine, european security, world ord. all of this rides on this question. if joe biden can get it done that is why it is worth having a conversation even though it kept us at it. >> the fate of the western world order rests on what happens in an american presidential election that is

where we are at. police stay with me. i have a lot more to ask you this hour. it say news night. many are talking about biden's press conference. one of them has had a lot to say. come out publicly after the president finished. the top democrat on the house intelligence committee joins me to give me his very, shall we say, interesting and controversial take on the president and his candidacy and his performance. he is going to join me after the break join me after the break

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. the idea, i served in the senate a long time, the idea that senators and congressman are running for office worry about the ticket is not unusual. i might add, there are at least five presidents running or incumbent presidents that had lower numbers than i have now, later in the campaign. so, it is a long way to go in this campaign. and, so, i -- i am going to keep moving, keep moving and because, look, more work to do. we have more work to finish. there is so much, we made so much progress. >> before president biden began his nato address, 14 democrats in the house and senate called for him to drop out of the race. by the time he answered the final question of his news conference, that risen to 16. among the democrats is congressman jim hims. top democrat on the house committee out with a new statement it reads t has been

the honor of my career to work with president biden on the achievements that secured his remarkable legacy in american history. it is in consideration of that legace that i hope biden will step away. the 2024 election will define future of american democracy and we must put forth the strongest candidate possible to confront the threat of trump's maga. i no longer believe that is joe biden. joining me now is congressman hims what did you see tonight and in recent days that lead you to believe that joe biden should step aside. >> it is really not about tonight. one of the sick aspects of this moment is that we are watching every speech, every rally, every debate and saying how did he do today? and that is just not the way to

think about the precedency of the united states. and, look, this is a really hard moment for democrats. it is a hard moment for democrats because loyalty and love and emotion are really important in politics. by the way there are no more important, no more than the story telling irish man joe biden that is why rallies are unbelievable. that is why people cry when they remember barack obama. that is good. it is good. the problem is, it can be taken to an extreme. it is loyalty and loyalty alone, unthinking loyalty to back a felon and sexist and rapist to follow a regime. at the end of the day those things that are so important to

politics must make way, as hard as it is, to a simple question which is, can we win this race and save our democracy? it is so unsexy and unromantic to say what about the polls, what about the report? completely dashes the poetry of campaigning. but, the hard reality is, and i am far from the only democrat that believes this, that if the numbers, the trajectory, what americans feel in their bones right now suggest not only that joe biden would lose the race or we would lose the senate and the house. and the stakes are so high that we need to set aside that loyalty and poetry and that romance and the charge of the brigade and we all go down together in favor of really hard nose analysis about if this is the way forward. and, you know, i have been with the president on a number of occasions. i have looked at the numbers.

no president has been re- elected with the disapproval ratings that our current president has. i will not stand silent as i see a trajectory to an electrical loss that leads to the precedency of donald trump and all that he has promised. >> why did you wait until the speech was over? did not have to do with his remarks tonight. was it nato? did you want to wait until the world stage had been cleared? can you talk a little more about the timing and if you expect other democrats coming out with similar statements? >> you know, it really, maybe old fashioned but there used to be a statement that partisanship and politics should stop at the water's edge. yes, i love joe biden and i have respect for him, by the way foreign policy is his strength as he demonstrated tonight. but no, i waited until after the nato conference to inject as i knew it would, a political

element into the discussion here. >> do you feel like the white house and specifically president biden is open to hearing statements like yours? given his posture tonight he was combative at the suggestion he was no longer up for it or stamina or even going to win. is he in a position to contemplate that? >> i have done a lot of campaigns, alex, the one thing after every losing campaign and i have seen hundreds of them is right up until the moment that the numbers are in and you lost you believe you will win. therefore, again, as i said before you have to set aside the loyalty, the hope that maybe there is a job two years down the road. the emotion, the love flvment is so much love in favor of a

cold hard appraisal of the facts. you just can not get away from that. i am unpopular in a lot of places. asking to step away. the numbers suggest we are goes to lose. i respect people with an opinion different than mine. the underlying thesis that we have not communicated the remarkable legislative achievements, the fact that for medicare recipients out-of- pocket costs are capped at $2,000. insulin is capped at $35 a month. the only problem is we are not communicating that well. i would just ask my fellow biden supporters, the people who love joe biden if you believe, if you have evidence that in the next five months that story will be so told by

the president that we will turn around the polling. that we will turn what is a losing hand into a winning hand. it papes me to say that. joe biden, his legacy is top 10 presidential material. it is absolutely a remarkable legacy. but if you don't look at this in a cold hard way you will be complicate in donald trump's second precedency. the bench is deep with democrats t. is. i don't know who the next candidate should be. i am not going to but i could name a dozen democrats who i believe not only galvanize african americans, women, the youth vote, but who i am confident could convey the message of the remarkable achievements that joe biden's administration did better than he is going to be able to do it. >> i am hearing from you the time for second chances, if you

will, is over. biden campaign clearly they had an aggressive schedule for the president, the white house did. they took, they had a rare press conference with a sit down interview with lester holt on monday. what i am hearing from you is skeptics including plane in his own party have seen enough and heard enough? and the time has come for the president to hear from his party resoundingly that he should no longer be at the top of the ticket. >> my question to you is that there has been so much hand rangling. is there more statements coming in the next 24, 36 hours? >> i don't know. this is not part of any coordinated effort. i don't know what my colleagues will do. i respect each and every one of

them. you ask about second chances. the country, democrats are in this moment where so pleased and perhaps not surprising, the president did a reasonably good job on foreign policy that you know so well. but this is what we are focused on, forgetting the fact that the precedency. an office that i never occupied and probably never will. so grueling, forget about a debate with donald trump. the precedency is 24/7. you are awoke enat 3:00 in the morning and russians are fueling missiles and your political opponent just accused you of being a traitor. this is a degree of stress that is unknowable to anybody but the president of the united states. and, you know, with as much as

i love and respect the man it is not if he can give a good press conference. it is if you believe the trajectory, both for the country, three years from now, political opponents are calling him a trader. is he able to be up for three days straight? this is a job. we are watching limp nans in pair -- watching olympians in paris. people need to ask themselves if that is the trajectory that they are witnessing right now. they need to be honest about it. set aside the love and loyalty and be honest. when you answer that question you are not talking about you, you are not talking about the president, you are talking about the united states of america and its future. >> congressman, thank you for your time, a big news night all

around. appreciate it. >> thank you. coming up, while president biden was in washington trying to convince allies and members of his own party that he can still do his job of protecting democracy, while that was happening, the republican candidate was hosting the leader of hungry at his house, again. we will have more on that, next again. we will have more on that, next i thought i was sleeping ok... but i was waking up so tired. then i tried new zzzquil sleep nasal strips. their four—point lift design opens my nose for maximum air flow. so, i breathe better. and we both sleep better. and stay married. everybody wants super straight, super white teeth. they want that hollywood white smile. new sensodyne clinical white provides 2 shades whiter teeth and 24/7 sensitivity protection. i think it's a great product. it's going to help a lot of patients. what causes a curve down there? can it be treated?

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. there is nobody better, smarter, better leader than orban. you know, the prime minister of hungry. he is a noncontroversial because he says this is the way it is and he is the boss. >> that is how he introduced a group of supporters to viktor orban. tonight, they met again, after he met with another friend of his russian president putin. in a post on social media orban said of his meeting, negotiations with president trump about peace, good news of the day, he will solve it. back with me now.

tommy, good news, viktor orban and donald trump worked out peace. >> that is wonderful to hear. you have to wonder about someone who chooses to hang with him. can't imagine he is a good hang. he finds himself with the most authoritarian leaders. how he he envies them and crush descent and make decisions and submeter democracy. wonderful, glad they figured it out. >> we are talking about the study and contrast, biden with nato, zelenskyy and a split screen moment for the global community with orban and trump meeting at mar-a-lago. there is fresh off of his meeting with putin. nbc reports that a source familiar with the trump/orban meeting. any talk of him being a back channel to putin is nonsensical

do you think it is? >> i don't think so at all, alex. not as straightforward. it is not just orban. he is seeing jinping, kim jong un, trying to demonstrate, look, i got a team as well. we want to totally overturn the order that is represented by nato itself. these are the stakes that are happening. and orban is a model of trump. he did his project 2025 after he was elected prime minister and democracy and going to a single party system. now, the reason i don't think it is fanciful, first of all he was just in moscow, he was just seeing putin, just days ago. and now what is he telling us, good news, there is a peace plan. he is telling us in that social media post, i talked to trump about what i talked to putin about. so, he may not be some kind of formal, you know, on the

payroll operative going back and forth with dep i would be shocked if he is not sharing his conversation with putin. you really think orban sat with him for hours and then with trump in mar-a-lago and did not mention anything he talked to putin about? pass anything on that came out of that meet something his instagram post alone suggests it talking about a peace plan. to me it highlights the stakes here between the block of countries and block of strongman that trump wants to be a part of versus if nato can hold together the support of the united states. >> it is unnerving moment for americans, for the global community. i want to, you know, get your thoughts on the segment we had going into this. we had congressman coming out with a statement, and from

someone lime jim himes who is steeped in international affairs it is a meaningful position, and what effect do you think it has on the global community that is watching everything unfold here in america. i know from your reporting they are following on an almost granual level what is going on in america right now. >> how closely european officials, especially people in nato are following everything that is happening in this election. and, you know, they know the names of members of congress, they met in many cases with them or with members of their staff, i don't think it goes unnoticed when a senior democrat with the depth of experience that he has with intelligence, national

security, foreign affairs comes out against biden. i think the question is going to be in the coming 24/48 hours. you asked him this question. are we going to see some dam break, right? some reporting to that effect we might hear from many more democrats on capitol hill in coming days. if that happens you might be in a situation where you might see some of president biden's friends, allies in these european countries who are admirers of his leaning on him. to my knowledge that has not happened yet. we have seen kind of anonymous anxiety in the reporting. will those people go on the record? will they start leaning on president biden to drop out? given the stakes for the global community? that is what i am going to keep an eye on in the coming days. >> you know, the congressman said that it did not, his

statement tonight did not have much of anything to do with the press conference that the president just had. i thought that was interesting. some level one understands why he would want to wait until the nato summit was over. on the other hand, biden campaign, democratic onlookers thought this press conference was a chance to resurrect his candidacy and all accounts it was not a bad night for him. do you worry that the sort of pendulum copes going back and forth and then, if someone is going to step in. is barack obama going to step in and get his hands dirty? >> well, look, first of all, sure, you don't like that going on too long. i would rather take a couple weeks to figure out if we have the best person to run the campaign against trump, you know, i don't know that, you

know, this is priced in, debate was bad and democrats are upset about it and having a debate about it internally. i don't know if it matters that much if it is a couple more days or a week. it is sand through the hourglass, a hard deadline with the nominating process. i think what you see from jim himes, look, that statement was clearly written before the press conference tonight, i thought one of the most powerful things he said is part of the challenge is we don't want to feel like every single time joe biden is out on camera it is some rivetting test. the fact that it is the dynamic is kind of the problem, actually. you get through one of these things and then it was slightly better than the abc interview so it inches in another direction. the question is, does the democratic party as a collective, most represented by officials in congress believe they want to head into the

election with joe biden? for the sake of winning the precedency and the sake of not harming and hopefully helping democrats? i think that it does feel to me like there are obviously a lot of conversations happening behind closed doors there will come to the forefront in the next several days. >> tommy are you that optimistic? >> i think it depends on what happens in congress. hearing from some as serious and thoughtful as jim himes was important. this is about patriotism and putting it ahead of loyalty was important and powerful message. if joe biden runs and the polls that we are looking at are accurate and we lose and donald trump is inaugurated as president joe biden is just a citizen like the rest of us. we all own this equally, we are all worry about what a second trump precedency would mean for this country, nato, taiwan, the

whole world is watching this election, the stakes are that high. i am glad we are having this conversation now. i am glad it is before the convention, i hope that joe biden is getting good information, he is not sort of, you know, saying bad polls for him are not real and good polls for him are. that is worrisome. it seems like it is leading more and more members of congress to say what they think, say what they have been saying privately publicly. he is not the best candidate to win this race. >> you know, you have done deep reporting inside of the republican party and in particular, with republicans who have bucked party orthodoxy. i am thinking about mitt romney and your book about him. i wonder if you see any common dna between the anguish of someone like that and what is happening inside of the democratic party right now? >> reporter: the thing that i always come away from in my conversations with mitt romney and the handful of republicans

like him is that it is just really hard to do this. it is really hard to do what jim himes just it. it is hard to speak out against the president who is leading your party. everything about the partisan eco-system that these politicians live in, incentivizes against that. your social life, your friends, your staff, your donors, the media you consume. everybody who is on your team wants you to just be a good soldier. you are expected to do what is best for the leader of your party. so, you know, i think it is no small thing that we now had, what is it, 16 congressional democrats come out and call for biden to step aside. i think there are people who believe it comes from

resentment or haters or whatever. i don't think that it is true. they are doing something hard, they are defying the partisan expectations that have been set for them. they are doing something that could very likely hurt them politically, and they are taking a risk. and i think that we should understand the statement that they are making and the things they are saying in that context. there is no political incentive for them to go out on a limb and call for the sitting president in their own party to step aside. they are doing it because they genuinely believe that he is not going to win this election and the stakes are too high to not say that out loud. >> ben, to that end i think we can never take our eyes off of the ball in terms of the stakes, right? we are talking about it in the context of nato. you discussed on your podcast,

trying to retroactively, well, preemptively trump-proof the alliance and talk about the alliance in a way that trump can understand if he is even listening. likening it to a club where you pay membership dues to. do you pay dues at dorell? i am not sure. for perspective the alternative is so catastrophically bad we should not lose sense of, you know, what was unfolding down at mar-a-lago today, as we talk about the future of the democratic party. >> yeah, you can not trump proof this scenario, alex. europe can not make whole the kind of defense that the united states provides to ukraine. europe, you know, collectively the military strength is nowhere near, not even in the conversation with the united states. and, so, what it means is that, ukraine could be cut off, ukraine could be subject to

russian domination and beyond that, alex, the momentum of global politics and it is teetering between a full swing of the pendulum in the direction of the trumps, and the benjamin netanyahu and the orbans and we can go on and list a bunch of strong men or can the pendulum edge back on people that want to protect the democracies that we have. that is what is at stake. if trump wins, it will swing hard in the other direction and the future of the world will be determined by hard strong men nationalists like donald trump and putin and jinping and that is going to be bad and that is going to be bad terms of the corruption of those people. these are existential stakes for the kind of world we want to live in, that is why it is so important, that is why we

say everybody keep your concerns to yourself, everybody needs to put their cards on the table particularly members of congress because the stakes cannot allow us to get this wrong.>> ben rhodes , thank you for spending the better part of this hour for me, i really present your time and perspective. we will have more on president biden's fight for his future, we have new reporting on what is happening inside the white house, that is after the break. the break. with wegovy®, i lost 35 pounds. and some lost over 46 pounds. ♪ ♪ and i'm keeping the weight off. wegovy® helps you lose weight and keep it off. i'm reducing my risk. wegovy® is the only fda-approved weight-management medicine that's proven to reduce risk of major cardiovascular events in adults with known heart disease

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>> tonight, president biden offered the strongest defense of his candidacy yet as he tries to convince members of his own party to stand with him. new reporting from the new york times, michael schmidt reveals that a small group of the white house campaign aides and advisers are considering ways to persuade the president to exit the race, there are three factors that are being

considered. they have to make the case to the president that he cannot win against donald trump, they have to persuade him to believe that another candidate like kamala harris could be to mr. trump and they have to assure mr. biden that the process to choose another candidate would be orderly and not devolve into chaos in the democratic party. joining me now is michael schmidt, investigative reporter for the new york times, thank you for being here. i do wonder since you were talking to those in his orbit whether they had expectations for tonight and whether there was any particular hope they had for the president's performance.>> i'm sure they hoped he would do well and they know this is a good opportunity to showcase himself again, but i think that there is a realization that there are larger forces at play and that putting the toothpaste back in the tube from the debate performance is something that is far larger than an interview with george stephanopoulos last week or the press conference today. and i think they come to that

realization in recent days and that they face a massive obstacle in the president himself, i think that what you saw tonight was a fair assessment of what the president thinks but i think he's even more entrenched than we even appreciated. he is a stubborn person who has defied the odds throughout his career, he has gone further than i think he ever thought he could, and he has often done that as the underdog and now he is in a massive political crisis and standoff with his own party as he stares this down. i think the people closest to him that have been with him for a long time are increasingly realizing this, that is an untenable situation and the biggest obstacle is convincing him that he has to step aside.>> you mentioned one of the three prongs of the strategy to convince the president is convincing him he is going to lose to mr. trump

in november. every time the president is given statistics about how his approval rating is underwater and at a historic low and unwinnable, that he's not doing well and that is in swing states and battleground states. there is an insistence that the polling isn't accurate. so what do they think it practically means to convince resident biden that he will lose to trump in november?>> he has to acknowledge that he has no direct path to winning and i think you see the problem, that is why we are in this standoff. you just had somebody on television, regardless of his politics is a fairly reasonable and thoughtful person in washington to come out and call for the president to step aside. the way that jim himes views the world is not different from

a lot of people in the house and senate and at the top of the democratic party and you have a president of the united states who said the poll numbers, he didn't take too seriously, and he thought he could overcome whatever odds he had, but obviously the other numbers about him as the best person to do this were things in his favor, so they were trying to have it both ways. but at the end of the day, he is entrenched and he wants to move forward and he is going to try everything he can to do that and that is why we are in this situation, we are in the third week, it has been two weeks since the debate and we will be entering the third week where democrats and people that are close to him are realizing that all we are doing is talking about our armchair of mental acuity, we are playing dr., saying tonight he only fumbled on three words and he was good on foreign policy, but that is not talking about the

existential threat the democrats say donald trump poses to the country. >> how can they stave off the party if biden does step down? >> i think there was the feeling after the first week of the debate, that the pressure was going to be so great that biden was going to step aside and chuck schumer and nancy pelosi were not going to have to get more deeply involved and it would take care of itself, and what we have seen in the past few days is a realization that this is not going to take care of itself in terms of biden stepping aside, there is going to have to be something larger that happens to go after that. himes made his decision public after the nato summit was over and after the president was off the stage and it obviously was a moment that a lot of people were paying attention, it is hard to believe he took a