The New York Times’ most prominent opinion writer has flip-flopped on the “coup” against President Joe Biden that she participated in.
Three weeks after Biden’s disastrous debate performance against former President Donald Trump on June 27, 2024, Maureen Dowd joined the chorus of editorial boards in the legacy press calling for the incumbent to bow out of the race. In a story titled “Lord Almighty, Joe, Let It Go!” Dowd opened with the words, “Everyone wants Joe Biden gone.”
The text and tone of the column made it clear that she was part of the “everyone.”
Striking a fatalistic tone, she wrote, “It makes me sad that Biden doesn’t see what’s inescapable: If he doesn’t walk away gracefully right now, he will likely go down as a pariah and ruin his legacy.”
On August 17, she wrote a piece with the headline “The Dems Are Delighted. But a Coup Is Still a Coup.”
She explained her position in Shakespearean terms:
“It wasn’t exactly ‘Julius Caesar’ in Rehoboth Beach. But it was a tectonic shift, and, of course, there were going to be serious reverberations. Even though it was the right thing to do, because Joe Biden was not going to be able to campaign, much less serve as president for another four years, in a fully vital way, it was a jaw-dropping putsch.”
Dowd appeared to regret the widely reported efforts of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and others to push the president out of the race during his COVID isolation at his Rehoboth Beach home. However, she pardoned their actions in part because “[Democrat leaders] decided to put the welfare of the party — and the country — ahead of the president’s ego.”
” Et tu, Nancy?” she later quipped.
Regardless, Dowd did not mention the role she or the broader press played in the effort to defenestrate Biden. The New York Times had endorsed Biden in 2020, so a shocking message was sent when the paper of record’s most prominent writer and the entire editorial board joined a call for him to bow out.
Moreover, the mostly left-wing legacy press was identifying disaster and making the first calls for Biden to drop out long before the Democratic Party elite joined in.
Fifteen minutes before the Trump-Biden debate concluded, Politico published the headline: “Dems freak out over Biden’s debate performance: ‘Biden is toast.'”
The next day The New York Times’ editorial board published its call for Biden to step down. It was joined by numerous other national outlets.
“As a Democrat, Biden Should Step Aside,” a Newsweek editorial headline read.
“10 options if Democrats actually try to replace Biden,” a story in The Washington Post was titled.
“Can Joe Biden Be Replaced as the Nominee? Here’s How It Could Happen,” a Time headline contemplated.
“Why Biden didn’t accept the truth that was there for all to see,” an editorial header in The Washington Post read above the subheader “If he has the strength and wisdom to step aside, the Democrats will have two months to choose another candidate.”
At the time, nearly every prominent Democrat, from former President Barack Obama to Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), was rebuffing calls for the president to step down.
With the convention now underway, Dowd has embraced a more vindicated and sarcastic tone, appearing to indicate that she believes she was proven right that selecting a nominee without a primary vote was a bad idea.
In a July column, she opposed a “coronation” of any candidate.
In the August column, she wrote sarcastically, “It’s going to be a glorious coronation — except that everyone’s mad at one another.”
She attributed this anger to Biden’s ouster, the disappointment among high-ranking Democrats that a moderate was not able to challenge Harris, and dissatisfaction in the Harris camp that she was not endorsed more quickly by figures like Obama.
Dowd’s bio in The New York Times that appears at the bottom of all her columns reads, “Maureen Dowd is an Opinion columnist for The Times. She won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for distinguished commentary.”