Former US President Donald Trump responds to President Joe Biden dropping out of presidential race

Former US President and Republican nominee in the upcoming election Donald Trump has reacted to Joe Biden dropping out of the presidential race.

Biden withdrew from the 2024 election race less than four months from polling day in a stunning about-face on Monday morning AEST.

The president took to social media to pull out of the race.

It follows weeks of mounting speculation over Biden’s political future as questions on his health and cognitive ability swirled, though the president repeatedly said he was not considering stepping down.

Trump took to TRUTH social, his own social media platform, to respond to the news.

“Crooked Joe Biden was not fit to run for President, and is certainly not fit to serve — And never was!” Trump said.

“All those around him, including his doctor and the media, knew that he wasn’t capable of being President, and he wasn’t.

“We will suffer greatly because of his presidency, but we will remedy the damage he has done very quickly.”

In a phone call with CNN minutes after Biden announced his exit from the 2024 race, former Trump described Biden as going “down as the single worst president by far in the history of our country”.

Trump has issued a fundraising appeal following the announcement, texting his supporters requesting they “chip in”.

He called on “one million pro-Trump patriots to chip in and proudly say: I stand with Trump”.

“If we’re going to win back the White House, it will all be because of the momentum we built at this very moment — right here, right now!” the text said.

Biden endorsed his Vice President Kamala Harris as his successor in a follow-up statement to his resignation.

“My very first decision as the party nominee in 2020 was to pick Kamala Harris as my Vice President.

“And it’s been the best decision I’ve made.

“Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year.”

Trump told CNN he thinks Harris will be easier to defeat than Biden would have been.

Trump campaign lashes Harris

Trump’s co-campaign managers Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles issued a statement Sunday attacking Harris, arguing she would be “be even worse for the people of our nation than Joe Biden”.

In a new statement, LaCivita and Wiles said: “Kamala Harris is just as much of joke as Biden is…. Harris has been the Enabler in Chief for Crooked Joe this entire time. They own each other’s records, and there is no distance between the two. Harris must defend the failed Biden Administration and her liberal, weak-on-crime record in CA.”

They attacked Biden as a “complete fraud and a disgrace to our country,” and argued Biden has been a “weak, pathetic, and incompetent as a leader”.

“And during this entire term, Kamala Harris — as well as every other Democrat in Washington, sat by and did nothing,” LaCivita and Wiles said.

“They are all just as complicit as Biden is in the destruction of our once-great nation, and they must all be thrown out of office.”

LaCivita and Wiles went on to refer to Biden as a “national security threat in great cognitive decline”.

“The question then to Kamala Harris is simple: knowing that Joe Biden withdrew from the campaign because of his rapidly deteriorating condition, does Harris believe the people of America are safe and secure with Joe Biden in the White House for six more months?”

Republican Vice Presidential nominee JD Vance also took aim at Harris.

“Joe Biden has been the worst President in my lifetime and Kamala Harris has been right there with him every step of the way.

“Over the last four years she co-signed Biden’s open border and green scam policies that drove up the cost of housing and groceries.

“She owns all of these failures, and she lied for nearly four years about Biden’s mental capacity-saddling the nation with a president who can’t do the job.

“President Trump and I are ready to save America, whoever’s at the top of the Democrat ticket. Bring it on.”