A-list actor George Clooney is the latest high-profile personality to call on Joe Biden to drop out of the US presidential race, saying “he cannot win” according to the New York Post. Just three weeks ago, Clooney and his wife Amal hosted the largest fundraiser in support of any Democrat candidate to date, raising US$30 million, an event attended by former US president Barack Obama and his wife Michelle. Clooney’s remarks were in an op-ed published Wednesday in the New York Times, adding he feels the 81-year-old president should step down. “I love Joe Biden,” Clooney wrote. “As a senator. As a vice-president and as president. I consider him a friend and I believe in him. Believe in his character. Believe in his morals,” adding “But the one battle he cannot win is the fight against time. None of us can.” “It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fundraiser was not the Joe “big F-ing deal” Biden of 2010,” he said. “He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate.” Clooney, the “proud,” “lifelong Democrat” also said his “party leaders need to stop telling us that 51 million people didn’t see what we just saw,” says The New York Post. “We are not going to win in November with this president,” he said. “This isn’t only my opinion; this is the opinion of every senator and congress member and governor that I’ve spoken with in private. Every single one, irrespective of what he or she is saying publicly.” It’s an opinion also shared by George Stephanopoulos of ABC News, who had an exclusive interview with Biden on July 5 in an effort to rescue the president’s image after his poor debate performance on June 27. An estimated 8.5 million Americans watched the 22-minute post-debate interview with Biden, which aired July 5 and was rebroadcast on This Week on July 7. TMZ reports Stephanopoulos was out and about Tuesday afternoon on 5 Avenue in New York City, when a pedestrian approached him and asked, "Do you think Biden should step down? You've talked to him more than anybody else has lately." His response “I don’t think he can serve four more years” was recorded by the pedestrian on his phone. “The pedestrian didn't have his phone pointed at George when the ABC News journalist gave his answer,” says TMZ. “The phone was pointed at the sidewalk, but it's clearly George's distinctive voice you're hearing.” “You don’t think he can serve four more years?” the pedestrian repeated before adding: “All right, that’s an answer.” Hours later after the video made headlines, Stephanopoulos expressed regret for offering his candid response. “Earlier today I responded to a question from a passerby. I shouldn’t have,” the news anchor told Puck News in a statement. And ABC News, in its own statement to the outlet, added: “George expressed his own point of view and not the position of ABC News.”
