A meme coin themed after Kamala Harris gained nearly 250% on Thursday, as pressure mounted on President Joe Biden to drop out of the presidential race following his poor debate with Donald Trump.
According to Dex Screener, Kamala Horris (KAMA), a deliberately misspelled Solana token marketed with a crappy cartoon of the US Vice President, has seen its market cap increase from $3.5 million at the time of the June 27 debate to nearly $11.9 million.
The price is down from its market cap all-time high of $22.2 million recorded on July 3.
Citing seven senior sources from the Biden campaign, the White House, and the Democratic National Committee, Reuters reported on July 3 that Harris is the most likely successor to Biden if he does not run for reelection.
Meanwhile, Jeo Boden (BODEN) is a similar misspelled mimecoin that refers to President Biden. According to CoinGecko, it has plummeted by more than 22% in the last 24 hours and 73.4% over the past week.
The rise of KAMA and the fall of BODEN came after the Biden-Trump debate on June 27. Political analysts noted Biden’s poor debate performance. He spoke in a hoarse voice and at times seemed to lose his train of thought.
At 81, Biden is the oldest person ever to run for president, and he has cited the cold, over-preparation and jet lag as reasons for his candidacy, despite being in the same time zone the week before the debate in Atlanta.
Biden’s approval rating drops, pressure grows
Voters, media outlets and Democratic lawmakers are pressuring Biden to step down as concerns grow that he cannot defeat Trump in the Nov. 5 election. Trump is ahead by 2.3 percentage points, according to a FiveThirtyEight poll.
A July 3 New York Times/Siena College poll also showed Trump ahead, with three-quarters of voters saying Biden is too old to be president, up 5 percentage points since the debate.
That’s according to a CNN poll on July 2, which found that three-quarters of American voters said the Democrats would be more likely to win the election if they nominated a candidate other than Biden. A CBS News poll on July 1 found that nearly half of Democratic voters thought Biden should not be the party’s nominee.
Bettors at Polymarket, a cryptocurrency prediction platform, predict that Biden has a 64% chance of dropping out of the race, up from 19% before the debate.
Biden’s dire poll numbers come as at least four House Democrats told Axios on July 3 that Biden should step down, one of whom said “a majority of members share that sentiment.”
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Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi also told MSNBC that it was “completely legitimate” to question whether Biden’s debate performance was “a condition” or just a “one-off.”
“I think it’s a fair question to ask both candidates, ‘Is this an episode or a condition?'”
WATCH: Speaker Honor Nancy Pelosi responds to Democrats’ concerns about President Biden pic.twitter.com/KRm2fdfXH0
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) July 2, 2024
On Wednesday, July 3, the Boston Globe editorial board joined the New York Times. With the New Yorker Atlanta Journal-Constitution requires Biden to step down and give another candidate a chance to beat Trump.
Biden will not back down
The Washington Post and New York Times, citing people close to Biden, reported that Biden acknowledged that he may not be able to continue to run if he fails to prove himself fit for office.
Despite the pressure, the president said he was still capable of doing his job.
“Let me be as clear as I can, as simple and as direct as I can: I’m running,” Biden said on a Zoom call with campaign staff on July 3, according to Politico. “No one is pushing me out. I’m not leaving. I’m going to be in this race all the way to the end.”
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