Washington: In a big jolt to the re-election campaign of President Joe Biden days after his debate debacle, a group of his fundraisers have opted to put on hold some USD 90 million in contributions pledged earlier if he remains on top of the Democratic presidential ticket.
“The cash freeze deals a blow to Biden’s campaign,” The New York Times reported about the development on Friday and said, the Democratic donors have told this to Future Forward, the largest pro-Biden Super PAC.
“The frozen contributions include multiple eight-figure commitments, according to two people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the situation,” the daily reported.
“The decision to withhold such enormous sums of money is one of the most concrete examples of the fallout from Mr. Biden’s poor debate performance at the end of June,” it said.
Following his disastrous debate performance against his Republican rival Donald Trump in Atlanta on June 27, Biden, 81, has been gradually losing his support from some of his key friends and allies. So far, as many as 18 Democratic lawmakers have asked him to drop from the November 5 presidential race.
The cash freeze is seen as another move by the party leadership to force him to leave the race. Biden has so far said that he is running and is confident of defeating Trump in the November presidential elections.
Future Forward is one of the largest Super PACs to support Biden. It has already announced USD 250 million in television and digital advertising reservations after the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August.
With PTI inputs