Video News Clips: In Their Own Words

‘He Will Be Someone That No One Wants Around’: Chris Cillizza Predicts ‘Really Bad’ 2 Months For Joe Biden

Screenshot/YouTube/Chris Cillizza

Former CNN political analyst Chris Cillizza forecast Thursday that former President Joe Biden is in for a rough two-month period as two books likely to portray him negatively are set for release.

“Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House” by Jonathan and Allen Amie Parnes will come out Tuesday, while “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again” by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson will be out on May 20. Cillizza, on “The Morning,” said both books will likely expose how Biden’s aides hid his degradation, leading him to become more of a pariah even within his own party.

WATCH:

“I think the next six-ish weeks, two months, are going to be really bad for Joe Biden,” Cillizza said.

“My sense is [“Fight”] is going to have a lot in it that is not great for Biden,” he added.

The former CNN analyst referenced Wednesday coverage by The Guardian that “Fight” reports there were Democratic discussions in 2023 about if Biden should drop out from the 2024 presidential race. The book also reports that former Vice President Kamala Harris’ aides “strategized around the possibility that Biden might die in office,” according to the outlet.

Cillizza then moved on to “Original Sin.”

“That [book] is aimed at really providing an autopsy of how Biden got to the point he got, given his age and obvious erosion of his capabilities. Those two books, I feel like, are going to shed a lot of light on how big this cover-up really was,” he said. “Again, I’ve said repeatedly, I think this is a big scandal. The fact that the Biden inner circle clearly knew he was diminished, they kept him from the media, they insisted to the media he was fine even while knowing he was not, what happened at the debate.”

“I think those two books are going to make this look way worse than we knew, that the situation had advanced further, there were more concerns, the Biden people were ignoring those concerns, there were more signs that he was degrading,” he added. “So I have a feeling that by the end of May, Joe Biden and his inner circle are going to even be more persona non grata than they are right now in the Democratic party.”

Biden has informed multiple Democratic leaders that he is willing to raise funds, campaign and do whatever it takes to assist the party in countering President Donald Trump, people close to the former president told NBC News. He also convened with newly elected Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin in February to offer his help, sources said.

“I don’t think anyone’s clamoring to have Joe Biden campaign for them right now. But I think by the end of May, he will be someone that no one wants around … Joe Biden may want to come back onto the campaign trail to help Democrats, but I don’t think there’s much appetite for it now,” Cillizza said. “And I think in six weeks from now, there will be absolutely none. So check out those two books … I have a feeling it’s going to be really bad for Biden and the people around them.”

Cillizza himself expressed remorse in December for not investigating concerns about Biden’s mental and physical health sooner, acknowledging he was wrong to overlook them during his tenure at CNN.

“As a reporter, I have a confession to make: I should have pushed harder earlier for more information about Joe Biden’s mental and physical well-being and any signs of decline,” he said.