Former Democratic Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips called ex-Biden adviser Mike Donilon one of the “ring leaders” attempting to keep former President Joe Biden in the 2024 race, warning that people like him are only concerned with “self-preservation.”

Before Biden dropped out of the 2024 race in July of that year, Democrats supported the former president, attempting to dismiss concerns from Republicans about his mental fitness. During an interview with Harvard’s Institute of Politics on Feb. 13, Donilon said the party had “lost its mind” over Biden’s disastrous debate performance, adding that sometimes people simply have “terrible debates.”

On “The Ingraham Angle,” guest host Kayleigh McEnany asked the former Democratic representative if Biden would “have prevailed” if he had stayed in the race. (RELATED: ‘Never Seen Anything Like This’: Fmr Clinton Pollster Says Dems’ Support ‘Is Falling Off A Cliff’)

“Now Kayleigh, Mr. Donilon, with all due respect, was one of the ring leaders of the cover-up,” Phillips said. “You know that wasn’t just a bad debate. That was a symptom of a president who was reaching the end of his first term not on solid footing and was not going to win that race no matter what and surely could not serve another four years.”

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Before Biden took the debate stage against President Donald Trump on June 27, advisers to the former president touted his policies and what they said was his mental fitness. Former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre attempted to downplay concerns, accusing Republicans of creating a negative narrative and dismissing videos of Biden appearing confused or stumbling over his words as “cheap fakes.”

However, after Biden was seen struggling to finish his statement and freezing mid-sentence during the debate with Trump, lawmakers, donors, and pundits called for Biden to end his campaign.

“Mr. Donilon knows that, but we have this really perverse incentive in Washington D.C. on both sides of the aisle to protect and preserve your proximity to power,” Phillips said. “I’m afraid Mr. Donilon, like so many others on your show, and on all the evening cable shows, say the same thing months down the road and forget where they were when the real issues happened.”

“I’m afraid he’s just one of them, and that’s the problem,” Phillips said.  “People more concerned about their self-preservation than their principles. Yeah, power is intoxicating. We see it all too much in Washington.”

Since Trump’s win, which cost Democrats their stronghold on key voting blocs, the party has struggled to unify behind a single message as the midterm elections approach. Major party donors are reportedly pausing donations to left-wing activist groups due to the party’s failures, causing many to struggle for cash, according to The New York Times.

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