Tucson Democratic Rep. Raúl Grijalva calls for Biden to drop out of race

Tucson Democratic Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva called Wednesday for President Joe Biden to leave the presidential race.

“If he’s the candidate, I’m going to support him, but I think that this is an opportunity to look elsewhere,” Grijalva told the New York Times in an interview.

Referring to the president, he added: “What he needs to do is shoulder the responsibility for keeping that seat — and part of that responsibility is to get out of this race.”

Grijalva became the second sitting Democrat in Congress to make that call, following Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas who did so on Tuesday. Biden “failed to effectively defend his many accomplishments and expose Trump’s many lies” during last week’s debate, Doggett said.

The New York Times said Grijalva cited the “precarious” state of the president’s campaign.

Grijalva questioned whether Biden could beat former President Donald J. Trump and said Democrats needed to “put up a fight,” the Times reported, adding that he emphasized Biden is a “good man” and that he will support him if he stays in the race.

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"But that decision should be based on the stakes of the race," Grijalva said, "describing the possibility of a second Trump presidency as 'very, very dangerous' and characterizing the former president as an 'anti-democratic, authoritarian despot,'" the newspaper reported. 

The Biden campaign declined to comment on Grijalva’s remarks, the Times said. Earlier Wednesday, the White House press secretary said the president was “absolutely not” considering withdrawing.

The Times noted that Grijalva, 76, and Doggett, 77, are close in age to 81-year-old Biden, "whose halting debate performance on Thursday reignited questions about his age and acuity."

Grijalva, who was first elected to the U.S. House in 2002 and is seeking a 12th term in this year’s election, announced in April that he has cancer and is undergoing treatment.

The other Democratic members of Congress from Arizona, a key battleground state in this year's presidential election, have stayed silent on the issue of Biden's continued candidacy as the party's nominee for president. Their offices did not immediately return requests for comment, The Arizona Republic reported Wednesday.