HONOLULU (KHON2) — Weeks after President Biden and former President Trump faced off in their first debate of the election season, more Democrats are calling on Biden to leave the race including three former Governors of Hawaii.

Democrats are questioning President Biden’s mental and physical stamina to lead the country for a second term following the first 2024 Presidential Debate. Democratic officials and organizations like Common Cause Hawaii, a nonprofit working to expand voting rights, have varying opinions on the matter.

“Getting lost in your thought, trailing off in your thought, that is something very common that has come to be expected of him,” stated Camron Hurt, Common Cause Hawaii Program Manager. “Why is this our candidate then? Is this the best that our democracy can produce?”

Governor Josh Green worked closely with the President during the Maui Wildfires back in August 2023. His outspoken support for President Biden is a much different opinion than his predecessors.

“It only took six hours for the President to approve our major disaster declaration,” said Governor Green. “Having that kind of open line of communication to President Biden and his team makes a difference. I’m appreciative of him as a friend.”

A letter asking for the withdrawal of President Biden by former Governors Neil Abercrombie, Ben Cayetano and John Waihee reads, “We witnessed and listened to a frail and seemingly muddled President Biden agonizingly take us to the brink of electoral wipeout.”

Read the full letter titled, ‘Doing the Right Thing,’ below:

According to the Democratic Party Chair, Derek Turbin, the President is unlike his poor performance during the Debate.

“Governor Green and I have had much more contact with the Biden campaign and, in fact, President Biden than these former governors,” said Turbin. “He was able to see a sharp, concise President Biden– a much different person than what I think a lot of people saw in the debate.”

Turbin added the opinion polls for Biden are much higher than people realize, especially after Biden beat Trump in crucial swing states, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Suppose President Biden were to step down before the convention. In that case, party leaders say another candidate would be reassigned during an open convention – Vice President Kamala Harris being the most ideal successor, according to Turbin.

“That would look like top leaders of the Democratic Party vying it out for a position on that ticket,” stated Hurt. “Democrats are strongly favoring wanting to put the Vice President, Kamala Harris, at the top of the ticket. Anybody else would make the situation that’s already a bit messy, more messy.”

For the second time in his career, Hawaii’s Kirby Yates is headed to Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game.

The Rangers closer was named to the American League roster, marking as the first time that he has been selected to the Mid-Summer Classic since 2019 when he was with the Padres.

In 2024, the Kauai native is 13-for-13 on save chances, having struck out 43 batters in 31.1 innings, with a dominant 0.86 ERA.

Yates, who led the league in saves with 41 in 2019 while in San Diego has bounced back from injury plagued seasons since then. He underwent two different surgeries since that All-Star season having spent time in Toronto and Atlanta prior to this season.

Yates, is now just the third Hawaii born player to ever be selected to multiple MLB All-Star games, joining Sid Fernandez and Shane Victorino who were both named to two ASG’s in their career.

The 2024 MLB All-Star Game is set for Tuesday, July 16 at 2:00 pm HST on KHON2.

President Joe Biden could make a decision within days whether to remain a candidate for reelection, said Hawaii’s governor who participated in a recent meeting with Biden and other Democratic governors and whose family has known the president for years.

And if Biden decides not to run, Hawaii Gov. Josh Green told The Associated Press on Saturday that he believes the president will designate Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him on the ticket.

“I think the president stays in this race unless he feels that it is not winnable, or he feels that he has to hear other voices in his inner circle that he shouldn’t run,” Green said. “If the president felt that he wasn’t up to it and truly not up to it, he would step down.

“We’ll probably know in the next couple of days how the president feels about all this,” he said.

Biden has repeatedly insisted that he will remain in the race against his likely Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump. But questions about Biden’s mental acuity have swirled since his disastrous debate performance last month. As some of his fellow Democrats have encouraged Biden to exit the campaign, the president has pointed to support from other elected officials in the party, particularly governors.

Green, who was a physician on Hawaii’s Big Island before he was elected governor, said everyone has parents or grandparents who have moments that aren’t that great or pauses in their ability to express themselves clearly. But, he added, they aren’t discarded because of their experience, wisdom and their role in the family.

“That’s why I’m standing by the president until he tells me otherwise,” said Green.

Green said the timeline of a few days for a decision anticipates pressure that might be placed on Biden after members of Congress return this week to Capitol Hill.

“I really, honestly think that he has to make the decision. And it should not come from another governor. It should not come from anyone but the closest, closest advisers to him and his own heart,” Green said.

Green was quick to point out that Trump is only three years younger than Biden and both will have bad days going forward. But he argued that temperament is more important than age.

“For God’s sake, these two guys have to hold the nuclear codes,” Green said. “I don’t want someone who tweets in the middle of the night and rages at other countries. That is not good. That’s not the problem we have with President Biden.”

If Biden were to leave the campaign, Green said the president should be allowed to say who he thinks should replace him on the ticket.

“I think it’s very clear that the Democratic Party would be ecstatic overall to have the president designate his vice president if it came to that,” Green said.

Harris “is a powerful person, she is also a thought-leading woman, she’s an African American who was (California’s) attorney general,” Green said. “There are no credentials that are better than what the current vice president has.”

Green, whose wife’s uncle was Biden’s college roommate, also provided insight into last week’s meeting that governors had with the president. During the meeting, Green asked Biden about his health. Biden responded by saying everything was fine except for his brain.

Green told the AP that the president was joking, and that context was lost when leaked by other people.

“It was absolutely a joke, and in order to make a self-deprecating joke, you have to have intact cognitive function, period,” Green said.

He also discounted any assertion that advisers crafted the meeting to have governors supportive of Biden speak first to quell any dissent. Instead, he said it was a very candid, unscripted conversation with 25 governors with differing opinions.

“That call had just like you’d expect in a coffee shop, a few people mouthed off, a few people, you know, probably excessively praised the president, but almost everybody was just trying to see, ‘Are we OK?’” Green said.