Dem lawmakers, donors threw a fit after Bidens debate flop: Who the hell is running the country?

Democratic lawmakers and donors were apoplectic following former President Joe Biden’s debate flop that eventually forced him to suspend his campaign, with some senior party operatives questioning “who the hell is running the country,” according to a new book on the 2024 race, Biden’s closest advisers watched the June 27, 2024, fiasco from a greenroom at CNN’s Atlanta headquarters, where the debate was held — and former White House chief of staff Ron Klain knew right away the night was a “disaster,” write Alex Thompson and Jake Tapper in their forthcoming tome “Original Sin.”Just 11 minutes into the showdown, Biden fumbled a question about the national debt by uttering a non sequitur — “We finally beat Medicare” — and later lost his train of thought while trying to defend his record on immigration.“I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence,” former President Donald Trump famously fired back.“I don’t think he knows what he said either.”Thompson and Tapper, who co-moderated the debate with CNN colleague Dana Bash, write that “it didn’t seem as if Biden had any idea how bad his performance was, though he did say, ‘Sorry about my voice; I have a cold.’ … Jake didn’t know what to say and attempted to make small talk with [Jill Biden] by showing her that he was wearing [Philadelphia] Phillies cuff links.“Senior Democrats who had done work for Biden in 2024 later told us that they had watched the debate and wondered: Just who the hell is running the country?”Ex-Biden senior adviser Mike Donilon argued that Biden was “bad but [the performance was] nothing they couldn’t handle.”But other Democrats from coast to coast were pulling their hair out as the incumbent spoke in a soft, raspy voice and struggled to make his case for re-election.“This is a f–king disaster,” said former White House press secretary and current MSNBC host Jen Psaki, who canceled a TikTok livestream after growing “s...