“In hindsight, knowing that he ultimately made a decision to stand down, yes, of course, it would have been better for President Biden to have made that decision earlier. I think there’s no question about it,” Murphy said on NBC News’s Meet the Press. 

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Biden dropped out of the race in July, and Harris took over the campaign with just 107 days left in the presidential race. She ultimately could not reach enough voters and lost the presidential election to President-elect Donald Trump.  

Some Democrats blamed the loss on Biden because he did not leave the presidential race sooner. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) had previously lamented Biden not dropping out sooner. Last month, in a New York Times interview, Pelosi said, “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race.”

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She added, “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary.”

During his Sunday interview, Murphy said Democrats should have emphasized the administration’s efforts to take on corporate power. Under the Biden administration, the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice have brought a number of antitrust lawsuits against big corporations such as Amazon, Meta, and Live Nation. 

“Some of the most important things that Joe Biden did were taking on the big corporations, going after their monopoly power, helping consumers with some of the really egregious fees and gimmicks that those companies use to hurt us,” Murphy said. 

He added, “I wish the Biden campaign, and the Biden White House and the Harris campaign talked more about what they did to break up corporate power.”