WASHINGTON — The Texas congressman who became the first sitting Democrat on Capitol Hill to call on President Joe Biden to withdraw from the presidential race is praising Biden for deciding to do just that.
“He really put his ego back behind his commitment to country, something Trump would never do,” said Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin.
Doggett made national headlines when he urged Biden to end his reelection campaign after Biden’s shaky debate performance against former President Donald Trump. Doggett hailed Biden's achievements as president but told Spectrum News that he felt Biden could not "effectively defend his many accomplishments.” Nearly three dozen of Dogett's colleagues followed his lead, before Biden pulled the plug on his candidacy Sunday.
“I think it opened the door for some who were a little reticent to do this. It was a little risky, but I thought the need was so great and the risk was so great of a Trump presidency that we had to put forward our strongest candidate,” Doggett said.
Shortly after Biden announced his decision to drop out, he endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to be the party’s nominee. Doggett said he originally preferred to see a “fully open convention.”
“I'm enthusiastic about her as a nominee, but I thought it was really important that it not appear that she had simply been crowned, a coronation by insiders in Washington, and that would involve more of the country,” Doggett said. “Time limits our ability to do that.”
Doggett said he would ultimately back the party’s nominee.
Many Democrats from Texas and across the country are rallying around Harris. They include Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Escobar, a Biden-Harris campaign co-chair who said on social media that Harris also, “earned 14 million votes in the primary.”
Rep. Marc Veasey, D-Fort Worth, was the first member of the Congressional Black Caucus to call on Biden to withdraw. He wrote on social media, “I’m proud of the progress we have made under the Biden-Harris administration and I know Vice-President Harris will continue to deliver.”
Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, said she was frustrated with colleagues who urged Biden to step down.
“Here it was, because of polls, we decide we need to dump our leader, not because he doesn't have a record, not because he hasn't proven that he's a leader,” Crockett told Spectrum News.
Now that Biden has stepped down, Crockett said Harris should be the party’s nominee because she believes the administration’s achievements belong to her as well. Crockett, who was a civil rights attorney, said she also has admired Harris as a prosecutor.
“It will be a slap in the face of any woman or any person of color if they decide that this woman who has done the work, not only as a prosecutor, not only as the attorney general, not only as only the second Black woman to enter the Senate, but also as the only woman to serve as vice president, to say, thank you for your service, but I will see you later,” Crockett said.
Early on in the administration, Biden tasked Harris with addressing the root causes of migration, as the number of illegal crossings at the southern border surged. Republicans in Texas and elsewhere are now calling Harris the “border czar” and are criticizing her work in that role.
“She bears direct responsibility for the chaos at our southern border,” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said in a press conference Monday.
On social media, Sen. John Cornyn wrote, “If she can’t fix the border, how is she going to run the country? Kamala Harris is even more radical, more extreme and less competent than Joe Biden.”
When asked about some Republican criticism that Harris is “too far left,” Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, said in part, “The only thing Republicans can do at this point is aim their fire at Kamala Harris politically, because they're rallying behind a guy who is a convicted felon.”