The seven people who could force Joe Biden’s hand

President Joe Biden faces the most serious crisis of his campaign, as a chorus of allies in the media — figures like The New York Times’s Thomas Friedman, CNN’s Van Jones, and even MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough — suggest he should relinquish the Democratic nomination.

But Biden was never much of a media darling, and aside from Scarborough, barely has any relationships with elite journalists.

Nor is he subject to any formal process from what’s left of America’s long-established, hollowed-out political parties. He’s already the nominee, and the only path to replacing him would be his own choice to withdraw.

The relevant question, then, is what might push him to make that choice.

There are two remaining factors that could force Biden off the ticket, no doubt in conversation with his family — notably his wife Jill and sister Valerie.

One is public polling. We may see a series of polls that show him losing badly, while other Democrats clearly beat Trump in the same polls. Despite conventional wisdom that a younger Democrat would do better, polling hasn’t clearly shown that to date. Californians Kamala Harris and Gavin Newsom are the only really plausible candidates at this stage, for a variety of reasons. Biden could find a way to hand off the baton cleanly.

The other is a small number of figures whose defection, as a group, would destroy Biden’s campaign. The mechanism is familiar: They’d call Biden, privately, and suggest he withdraw. And there would be an unspoken threat that if he doesn’t, they will do so publicly or, almost as bad, leak the fact of the call.

The list is short, with just seven key players outside the president’s family: Barack Obama and Bill Clinton probably top it. Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi carry real weight. And the New Yorkers who lead Congress have sway too: Chuck Schumer because he really does channel the sense of his Senate caucus, and wouldn’t move without it; House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries perhaps less so because he’s so new to leadership, but also because he’s a cautious figure who could only move if he reflected a real consensus. The South Carolina Congressman Jim Clyburn, whose support helped turn the 2020 nomination for Biden, rounds out that list.

And that’s a short list. It reflects a party structure that has been reformed almost out of existence, and a leadership class that has, too, withered almost to nothing.

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