George Clooney isn’t apologizing for his op-ed imploring President Joe Biden to pass the torch during the lead-up to the 2024 election.
The Oscar winner stood by his divisive New York Times essay while talking to CNN’s Jake Tapper about his role as newsman Edward R. Murrow in the Broadway adaptation of his 2005 film, “Good Night, and Good Luck.”
As Clooney spoke about his admiration for Murrow, an outspoken critic of anti-communist crusader Sen. Joseph McCarthy, Tapper said that many have also called Clooney courageous.
“I don’t know if it was brave. It was a civic duty,” said the actor, referring to his July 2024 piece titled “I Love Joe Biden. But We Need a New Nominee.”
Describing himself as a Kentucky Democrat, Clooney told Tapper that when he “saw people on my side of the street not telling the truth, I thought that was time to” confront the issue of Biden’s age.
Asked if his op-ed angered people, the actor-director said he couldn’t take offense at the criticism.
“That’s OK, you know,” he told Tapper. “Listen, the idea of freedom of speech is you can’t demand freedom of speech and then say, ‘But don’t say bad things about me.’”
“That’s the deal, you have to take your stand if you believe in it,” Clooney continued. “Take a stand, stand for it and then deal with the consequences. That’s the rules.”
Reminding Tapper how he already dealt with blowback for his opposition to the Iraq War, he said, “People picketed my movies and they put me on a deck of cards: I have to take that, that’s fair.”
After President Joe Biden’s disastrous presidential debate performance last June, captured here, Clooney believed Democrats had no chance of winning without a shift in power. ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS via Getty Images
“I defend their right to criticize me as much as I defend my right to criticize them,” the “Burn After Reading” star continued.
In his essay, the devoted Democrat and high-profile fundraiser argued that Biden simply couldn’t lead the left to victory after the world witnessed his dismal debate against now-President Donald Trump.
“We are not going to win in November with this president,” he stated bluntly in the op-ed, adding that the fate of the House and Senate were also at risk.
Though President Biden would bow out of the race less than two weeks later and christen Vice President Kamala Harris as his successor, the shift in strategy did not save the day.
