McCaskill: VP Harris or Gavin Newsom Should Be at the Top of the Dem Ticket After Tonight

MSNBC contributor Claire McCaskill said Thursday, following the presidential debate, that President Joe Biden’s performance was so bad that Vice President Kamala Harris or Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) should be at the top of the ticket.

McCaskill said, “Joe Biden had one thing he had to do tonight and he didn’t do it. He had one thing he had to accomplish, and that was reassure America that he was up to the job at his age, and he failed at that tonight. Now, does that mean that my phone blowing up with senators and campaign operatives and donors, big donors from all over the country, Does that mean that Joe Biden is not the candidate? I don’t know that. I think we will know a lot more in a few weeks, how this plays out, how the polling plays out. But I think a couple of things are going on right now. I think I’m not the only one whose heart is breaking right now. There are a lot of people who watch this tonight and felt terrible for Joe Biden and you know, you have to ask, how did we get here? How did we get to the point that we are spending a whole lot of time talking about the vice president tonight instead of talking about the president. I don’t know how the rest of the story is written. I don’t know if things can be done to fix this. They might, and Trump is so terrible that this might heal itself, but based on what I’m hearing from a lot of people, and some of them are people that are in high elected offices in this country and you might guess where they serve, there is a lot more than handwringing tonight. I do think people feel that we are confronting a crisis.”

She added, “This could be a situation where everyone talks it out over the next few days. I do think that this is a time that Ted Kaufman, and Donilon and Ron Klaine are going to have to have a heart- to-heart with the president about his ability to exude strength. Listen, nobody is a a fan of Kamala Harris than I am and you know, Gavin Newsom did a remarkable job tonight as a surrogate and saids stuff I agree with but those two people are signaling to a whole lot of Americans that are paying attention, how come they’re not running? How come the Democratic Party doesn’t have them at the top of the ticket instead of using them to shore up what had become after tonight some glaring weaknesses in our president.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN