It’s as simple as picking up the phone.
Veteran political reporter and senior political columnist for POLITICO, Jonathan Martin, made the argument Friday that President Joe Biden is dropping the ball in an easy way to possibly bring more people, including Repbuclans, into his circle and keep former President Donald Trump out of the White House.
Reach out to them
Martin used former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie as an example. After Christie dropped his latest presidential campaign, he flirted with a third-party bid with No Labels that Martin argued is “part of an indictment of Biden.”
“It has been well over two months since Christie dropped out of the Republican presidential primary. How has Biden not called Christie, whom he’s known since the former governor was in student government as a University of Delaware undergraduate, to ask for his support? Or, if he thought that too soon or too direct, he could at least have asked Christie to get together. But that ask has not been made,” Martin wrote.
Martin added: “I reached out to every current Republican lawmaker who has refused to commit to Trump in the general election. Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) Mitt Romney (Utah), Todd Young (Indiana), Bill Cassidy (Louisiana) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) all said the same: they’ve not heard from Biden. ‘It is surprising,’ Collins told me. ‘It’s especially surprising because President Biden does understand the Senate, he has personal relationships with some of us.’
Other seasoned reporters agreed.
“Some congressional Democrats have a similar complaint that the former lawmaker doesn’t do this kind of thing anymore. @jmart on lack of outreach by President Biden,” The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman posted to X, formerly Twitter.
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Matt Arco may be reached at marco@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @MatthewArco.
