Right thing to do: Indian-Americans on Biden dropping out of 2024 Presidential race

NEW YORK: US President Joe Biden did the “right thing” by dropping out of the 2024 presidential race, prominent members of the Indian-American community have said, noting that this must have been a hard decision for him to make but one he took to put “America first.”

Biden, 81, announced on Sunday that he decided to give up running for re-election as president of the United States and endorsed his deputy Harris to be the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party.

“While I acknowledge President Biden's decision to drop out of this race, I accept that decision as his last act to preserve American exceptionalism and as an ‘America First’ decision,” New York-based eminent Indian-American attorney Ravi Batra told PTI.

"Thank you, Joe Biden, for doing what must have been the hardest decision for you, and yet what every soldier on the battlefield does - give our last best measure to America,” he said.

Al Mason, prominent New York-based global real estate advisor and entrepreneur who also advises international education institutions, said that it was expected that Biden would drop out of the 2024 presidential race.

“He did the right thing. He is a good man, but he could never win against Trump. In fact Biden's endorsed candidate Kamala Harris too cannot beat Trump. She has no appeal in the battleground states,” Mason said.

Batra said Biden has served the United States with distinction and his 50-year career, especially as Senate Foreign Relations chair and then as President Barack Obama’s vice president are “remarkable”. He added that the citizens of the country are at their core not Democrats or Republicans or Independents but are Americans first.

Biden has done his “finest duty by dropping out, knowing that he cannot be a standard bearer for the Democratic Party and win against” Republican presidential nominee former US President Donald Trump who after being shot at during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, “in a moment of extreme personal crisis had the strength of heart and mind on the stage with a face bloodied to put up his fist and say ‘Fight’.”

“After all, that's what all we Americans do. We fight for democracy. We fight for meritocracy, because if we don't fight it's all over. It's game over,” Batra said.

Mason said Trump is “impossible” to beat, even more so now with his 39-year-old Vice Presidential candidate Senator J D Vance, who has great appeal in states like Arizona, North Carolina, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.