STEVE INSKEEP, BYLINE: A top Democrat is saying what he really thought about President Biden seeking a second term. A number of Democrats spoke to The Wall Street Journal last week about the president's fitness years before the debate that forced him to drop out of the presidential race. The journal asserts the White House limited the president's meetings and even kept negative information away from him. Now, NPR has not independently confirmed some of the story's details, but some sources are quoted on the record, including Representative Adam Smith of Washington state, who's the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee.
We called the congressman, and he told us a story of struggling to get through to the president back in 2021. Smith says he wanted to warn about a vital issue - that he felt the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan was about to go wrong.
ADAM SMITH: I was concerned that they were being overly optimistic about what was going to play out. But more than anything, I just wanted an interaction with the White House, to talk about it and, you know, share, you know, policy concerns and where we're going in anticipation of the Afghan government collapsing once we pulled out.
INSKEEP: What happened when you reached out to the White House, as a senior member of Congress will do from time to time, and said I need to get on the president's schedule - I need a few minutes on the phone with the president?
SMITH: Well, a couple of things happened. One, you know, OK, we'll work on it. And two, it never happened. And this is not an unusual complaint from members of Congress that they don't have enough access to the White House. But Afghanistan was really important, and in those first six months of President Biden's term, it was really hard to get in and have that conversation.
INSKEEP: The Wall Street Journal puts this in a broader context of multiple occasions where lawmakers couldn't get in touch with the president, which even after all we've heard is a little surprising to hear about happening in 2021, because this was a guy who came out of the Senate, who was a politician who had a lot of relationships and was known for talking with people.
SMITH: Now, it was surprising to me. He had a small group of very close advisers, and they were fairly insular about it. I also got the impression that, yes, he was the senator. And it certainly seemed like he gave the Senate more access than the House.
INSKEEP: Some people listening to this anecdote will wonder, well, why didn't Adam Smith speak out in 2021 and express his worries about the president in 2021?
SMITH: No, I was not worried at all about the president's ability to do the job. I was not worried that he had any sort of mental problem or that he was not physically healthy enough to do the job. But the second piece of it is, you know - I've said this before - I never for one second thought that it was a good idea for Joe Biden to run at the age of 82 for a second term. So I had those concerns. There wasn't any particular reason at that point to go out publicly and start saying, oh, he shouldn't run again. It's 2021. That's a long way off.
INSKEEP: A little bit later, 2022, 2023, you do have Democrats concerned. There were reports of meetings to discuss who the nominee might be instead. One of your house colleagues, Dean Phillips, was going around getting more and more alarmed about the idea of Biden serving another term, ultimately even declared his own run against Biden in the presidential primaries. Did you think about speaking out in that period?
SMITH: I thought about it, and it was a difficult decision. I like Dean. There was no way on God's green Earth Dean Phillips was going to beat Joe Biden in a primary, as obviously played out. I was very concerned as it appeared that Trump was increasingly likely to come back as the nominee, and it put all of us in a really difficult position. So when the debate happened and it became clear that President Biden was not ready to run again, that's when I did choose to speak out. Prior to that, I didn't think me stepping up and saying anything was going to have any impact on him not running again. We would've just weakened our only nominee.
INSKEEP: Ultimately, of course, he did withdraw, but Kamala Harris got only a little more than a hundred days, I think, to make her case to the American people.
SMITH: Yeah.
INSKEEP: Do you think that was significant or even decisive?
SMITH: (Laughter) Yes. Yes, I do. I think it was a really bad decision on behalf of Joe Biden and the people around him to decide to have him run again.
INSKEEP: What are the lessons from that?
SMITH: Oh, gosh, there are so many. When you get elected president, there's something about it. I mean, it's an incredible accomplishment. I mean, it's awful easy to start thinking that, you know, every decision you've ever made in your life is right. You really have to work hard to make sure that you still surround yourself with people who give you critical thinking. Second, I think, you know, the Democratic Party sometimes struggles to make judgments about people. You know, it's not disrespectful for someone in a high position - me, for that matter, OK? I'm the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee. If it gets to the point where people question whether or not I'm up to the job, they should take me on. I think Democrats, much more so than Republicans, have a tendency to not want to make those kind of judgments and force that kind of competition. And I think it does hurt us.
INSKEEP: Democratic Representative Adam Smith of Washington state. Thanks for joining us again. Really appreciate it.
SMITH: Thanks for giving me the chance.
ASMA KHALID, HOST:
In a statement to NPR, a White House spokesman said The Wall Street Journal excluded public comments refuting the story's premise. The White House added that keeping meetings on schedule is an unavoidable challenge for any administration and that, quote, "it would be unusual for members of Congress to think that any president is sufficiently available to them." There are over 500 legislators while there is one commander in chief.
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