By Molly Goddard
2:15am PDT, Mar 29, 2025
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According to a new book, there was real fear President
Joe Biden would die in office.
In the upcoming tell-all,
Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House, authors
Jonathan Allen and
Amie Parnes spoke with Democratic insiders who claim there were contingency plans put in place in case the 82-year-old passed away while serving as the 46th commander-in-chief of the United States.
Join us to read about what happened behind the scenes of the Biden administration…
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Although Joe Biden's team insisted he was fit for the job until he dropped out of the race in July 2024, the authors claim Vice President
Kamala Harris' team privately "strategized around the possibility that Biden might die in office."
"In hush-hush talks starting in 2023, [DNC] officials gamed out Biden-withdrawal scenarios, according to two people familiar with them," the upcoming book — out on April 1 — alleges, according to
The Guardian.
"They wanted to make sure the party was ready for every possible circumstance: If Biden launched his campaign and then stepped aside before the primaries; if he won a bunch of primaries and then could not continue. If he secured enough delegates for winning the nomination but dropped out before winning a floor vote at the convention, and if he left a vacancy at the top of the ticket after taking the nomination," they added.
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The Democratic party began to panic about Joe Biden's mental fitness following his worrisome June 12, 2024, debate against
Donald Trump where he appeared to struggle to maintain complete thoughts.
"One official involved in secret talks put a fine point on the fear that Biden would not make it to election day as the party's nominee: 'It shows what we had to do to prepare with the unique circumstances we had, which was an 80-plus-year-old president who was running," the insider explained of the left-wing leader's short-lived campaign.
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Per the book, Kamala Harris' former Communications Director
Jamal Simmons — who departed his job in January 2023 — was allegedly involved in prepping a "death-pool roster" of judges who could be on call in case the former district attorney needed to be sworn into office quickly if Joe Biden died.
Although Simmons "never told the vice president about the death-pool roster before leaving her camp," he requested to be "notified immediately if something happened to Biden, because he had worked out an entire
communications strategy."
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Ultimately, Kamala Harris took over the Democratic ticket from Joe Biden and lost to Donald Trump. Despite the defeat, people on the left don't seem to regret suggesting the Delaware native end his campaign and hand it over to his
second-in-command.
"One veteran operative summed up the sentiments of Democrats who worried they would get stuck with Harris but still wanted Biden out: 'Well, at least she has a pulse,'" the book alleged.
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The final straw occurred days after the disastrous debate performance when New Jersey Governor
Phil Murphy hosted a donor reception where Joe Biden "didn't look well" and "didn't sound vital," according to insiders.
Behind the scenes, the former VP was urged by
Barack Obama to drop out of the race. "What is your path?" the 44th president allegedly asked Biden before he made the big decision.
