"Serious doubts"

Prominent US Democrat now calls for Biden’s resignation

Doubts about the competence of US President Joe Biden are apparently growing. As the most prominent representative of the Democratic Party to date, Congressman Adam Schiff called on Biden on Wednesday to renounce his candidacy for a second term in office.

In a statement for the Los Angeles Times, Schiff appealed to the 81-year-old president to "pass the baton". He had "serious doubts" that Biden would be able to defeat his Republican challenger Donald Trump in the election in November.

Warning against Trump, praise for Biden's achievements
Schiff is considered an influential Democrat. The Californian became known to a wider public as the leader of the impeachment proceedings against Trump in the US House of Representatives. "A second Trump presidency would undermine the foundations of our democracy, and I have serious doubts about the president's ability to defeat Donald Trump in November," Schiff explained. At the same time, Schiff, who is running for a senatorial post in the November election, also paid tribute to Biden's achievements.

Kamala Harris is seen as the logical successor to Biden.(Bild: JIM WATSON / AFP / picturedesk.com)

Since his disastrous performance in the first televised debate with Trump, the latter has been confronted with a debate in his Democratic Party about his mental and physical suitability to be the next presidential candidate. A new poll by the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research also found that only three in ten Democrats are very or fairly certain that Biden has the mental capacity to serve effectively as president.

The assassination attempt on Trump had only briefly silenced discussions about Biden. If Biden were to withdraw, Vice President Kamala Harris would be the logical Democratic presidential candidate. Like Schiff, she comes from California and previously represented the most populous US state in the Senate.