George Clooney Admits Replacing Biden with Harris in 2024 Was a ‘Mistake’

George Clooney recently spoke about his 2024 New York Times op-ed in which he urged President Joe Biden to step aside for the presidential election.

In an interview on CBS’ “Sunday Morning,” Clooney said he has no regrets about writing the piece but admitted that having Kamala Harris replace Biden as the Democratic nominee turned out to be, in hindsight, “a mistake.”

Clooney explained, “Yes. We had a chance. I wanted there to be, as I wrote in the op-ed, a primary. Let’s battle-test this quickly and get it up and going. I think the mistake with it being Kamala is she had to run against her own record. It’s very hard to do if the point of running is to say, ‘I’m not that person.’”

“It’s hard to do, and so she was given a very tough task. I think it was a mistake, quite honestly. But we are where we are.” He also added that the alternative would have been to stay silent, which he felt was not an option.

The op-ed came after Biden’s rough performance in his first presidential debate with Donald Trump, which prompted some in Hollywood to call for a stronger candidate. Clooney became a central voice in this discussion, writing that Democrats risked losing key House and Senate seats if Biden remained the nominee.

“We are not going to win in November with this president. On top of that, we won’t win the House, and we’re going to lose the Senate. This isn’t only my opinion; this is the opinion of every senator and congress member and governor that I’ve spoken with in private. Every single one, irrespective of what he or she is saying publicly,” he wrote in the essay.

Clooney also addressed the criticism he faced for the piece. Speaking to CNN’s Jake Tapper, he said, “That’s the deal, you have to take your stand if you believe in it. Take a stand, stand for it and then deal with the consequences. That’s the rules, so when people criticize me — they criticized me for my stance against the war 20 years ago, people picketed my movies and they put me on a deck of cards — I have to take that, that’s fair. I’m OK with that, I’m OK with criticism for where I stand. I defend their right to criticize me as much as I defend my right to criticize them.”

Clooney’s comments highlight the difficulty of political decisions and the pressures on public figures who speak out. He emphasizes that being honest and taking a stand is more important than avoiding backlash.

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