Hollywood megadonor Ari Emanuel torches Biden, says donors are moving money downballot: 'We're in f--- city'
Hollywood Democratic megadonor Ari Emaunel fumed over President Biden following last week's presidential debate, declaring "We're in f--- city" as he and other donors continue to navigate their party in disarray.
Appearing at the Aspen Institute's Ideas Festival on Friday, the day after Biden shocked the nation with his dismal debate performance, Emanuel was asked to react to Democrats "jumping out of the window."
"Well, I'm pissed off at the Founding Fathers. They had the start date of 35. They just didn't give us the end date," Emanuel said.
"Here's what Biden did: He said he was gonna run for one term, and he's doing it to restore democracy. He now runs for a second term. First bit of malarkey, as he would say," Emanuel said.
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The high-powered Hollywood agent continued, "Then he says it's a quintessential thought about saving democracy and so important, etc. His cohorts have told us that he's healthy for over a year. And I think it was two weeks ago, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal – and I had a father who was died at 92, but at 81, I took away his car. And it's a very simple test for me. If you were driving from downtown Beverly Hills to Malibu, would you want Biden to do it at night? Would you want Trump to do it at night? Or neither?"
"If it's neither, you cannot have them running a $27 trillion-dollar company called the United States," Emanuel answered, sparking applause from the liberal audience.
The talent agency mogul said Biden "is not the candidate anymore" and suggested his campaign will hit a dead end as a result of big money "drying up."
"The lifeblood to a campaign in politics, the lifeblood is money," Emanuel said. "And maybe the only way this gets – with smart lawyers looking at it – is if the money starts drying up. And I've talked – I mean, I'm assuming all of you've gotten a lot of calls. I've gotten a lot of calls. We've all sat there… But if this is, as Biden says, the fight for our democracy… man, he gave us a bunch of malarkey and I'm really pissed. We all should be really pissed."
"You're gonna see polling in the next couple of weeks if the money comes in. I've talked to a bunch of big donors, and they're moving all their money to Congress and the Senate. I mean, I can't believe we're in this situation," Emanuel later said. "It's a legal issue now. You're not in ‘I’m gonna resign,' you know, unless the lawyers tell you something else and maybe there's some wiggle room. I haven't seen it and I'm not a lawyer. But we're in f--- city."
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Biden's shocking debate performance has become a political earthquake with wide swaths of the liberal media calling for him to withdraw from the presidential race.
"Mr. Biden has been an admirable president. Under his leadership, the nation has prospered and begun to address a range of long-term challenges, and the wounds ripped open by Mr. Trump have begun to heal. But the greatest public service Mr. Biden can now perform is to announce that he will not continue to run for re-election," The New York Times editorial board wrote Friday.
However, top Democrats are rallying behind Biden, including former President Obama.
"Bad debate nights happen. Trust me, I know," Obama said in a statement Friday. "But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself. Between someone who tells the truth; who knows right from wrong and will give it to the American people straight — and someone who lies through his teeth for his own benefit. Last night didn’t change that, and it’s why so much is at stake in November."
There has been a dramatic increase in reports shedding light on the president's mental decline in recent months.
CNN's Carl Bernstein reported Monday that some of Biden's close allies told him that they've witnessed "15, 20 occasions" where the president appeared like he did at the debate and that his performance was "not a one-off."
Meanwhile, Axios reported that aides claim Biden is only "dependably engaged" from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The New York Times reported debate prep at Camp David "never started before 11 a.m." and that Biden took "an afternoon nap" each day.
There is also panic among the donor class. MSNBC political analyst John Heilemann revealed that bigwig Democratic donors are "freaked out" that Biden relies on teleprompters during their private fundraisers.
"He never ad-libs. He's never just off prompter… I mean, you're sitting with a bunch of, like, 40 multimillionaires who are writing you giant checks. You have 15 minutes of remarks to give over dinner, and you're on prompter. Again, does that make him a bad president? No. Does that make him unfit to be president? No. Does it freak donors out that he needs to be on prompter? It freaks them out," Heilemann said.