JD Vance, the Republican senator from Ohio newly tapped as former President Trump’s running mate, is hitting the campaign trail on Monday, as Vice President Harris’ team scrambles to consolidate support from Democrats a day after President Biden bowed out of the race. 

Vance, who Trump a week ago named as his vice presidential pick on the heels of surviving an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, is scheduled to hold a campaign rally in his hometown of Middletown, Ohio, on Monday afternoon. Later Monday evening, Vance is to hold another rally in Radford, Virginia. 

For the first time since Biden announced he would no longer seek re-election, Harris spoke at the White House Monday morning during an event honoring NCAA college athletes. 

‘Our president, Joe Biden wanted to be here today. He is feeling much better and recovering fast, and he looks forward to getting back on the road,’ Harris said at the start of her remarks. ‘And I wanted to say a few words about our president. Joe Biden’s legacy of accomplishment over the past three years is unmatched in modern history.’

Harris, who recalled first getting to know Biden through his late son, Beau, championed the president’s ‘honesty, his integrity, his commitment to his faith and his family, his big heart and his love, deep love of our country.’ She said she is a ‘firsthand witness that every day our president, Joe Biden, fights for the American people. And we are deeply, deeply grateful for his service to our nation.’

Biden, who has been self-isolating in Rehoboth, Delaware, after testing positive for COVID-19 last week, dropped the bombshell announcement Sunday that he would no longer seek re-election. In a letter shared online, Biden endorsed Harris as the Democratic nominee and said he would focus on his duties for the remainder of his term. He still has not been seen publicly since making the announcement.

Reuters reported that campaign officials have already made hundreds of calls on Harris’ behalf insisting that delegates name her the Democrats’ presidential nominee during next month’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago. 

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat once viewed as a potential rival to Biden, said in an X post Monday that she endorses Harris. Another Democrat, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, said during an appearance on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’ that he too endorses Harris as president and signaled interest in potentially joining her ticket as vice presidential running mate.

Harris released a statement Sunday after Biden stepped aside. 

‘My intention is to earn and win this nomination,’ Harris said. ‘I will do everything in my power to unite the Democratic Party – and unite our nation – to defeat Donald Trump.’

Sources told Reuters that the Trump campaign has been preparing for Harris’ possible entry into the race for weeks, as increasing numbers of Democratic lawmakers and donors called on Biden to step aside following his stumbling and stalled debate performance in Atlanta last month. 

President Biden’s exit from the 2024 race means former President Trump will be the oldest nominee in U.S. history, a fact not lost on Democrats looking to turn the age question around on Republicans.

‘This will probably boil down to Donald Trump, who is the oldest nominee in history, against Kamala Harris,’ Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla., said in reaction to the news that Biden was dropping out of the race, according to a report in The Associated Press.

Maxwell’s comments come as the race for the White House was thrown into chaos Sunday by Biden’s announcement that he was stepping aside, arguing in a statement posted to social media that he made the decision ‘in the best interest of my party and the country.’

Concerns over what was in the best interest of the party and the country mostly focused around Biden’s age and mental acuity, an issue that became even more prominent after the president’s disastrous debate performance at the beginning of the month. Calls for Biden, who would be 82 by inauguration day, to drop out of the race continued to intensify in the weeks after the debate, finally leading to his decision to step aside Sunday.

That decision makes Trump, 78, the oldest nominee in history, opening up the new line of attack from Democrats.

‘Donald Trump is too old to be President,’ Democratic Ohio State Rep. Casey Weinstein posted on X in reaction to the news that Trump was now the oldest ever nominee.

‘The man is nearly 80-years-old and so the question is, can he serve another four years? I’m not sure he can,’ former South Carolina state Rep. Bakari Sellers, a Democrat, told CNN.

Vice President Kamala Harris, who Biden endorsed to top the ticket after dropping out, also plans to attack Trump’s age if she eventually does become the nominee, according to a report from the Telegraph, citing the vice president’s deputy chief of staff.

The report also added that Erin Wilson, a West Wing veteran, hinted at a similar strategy, saying in a call with the group ‘Win With Black Woman’ that Harris would make ‘the issue of age and fitness a liability for Trump.’

‘Her role as a prosecutor makes her the ultimate contrast to Trump, the convicted felon,’ Wilson reportedly said on the call.

When reached for comment by Fox News Digital, Harris campaign spokesperson James Singer said that the ‘American people are rightly concerned that the Republican Party has nominated Donald Trump, a 78-year-old convicted criminal,’ adding that Trump ‘has spent decades screwing over working people and now wants to destroy our democracy, ban abortion, and only cares about himself.’

Vice President Kamala Harris, who recently became the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for president after President Biden stepped down on Sunday, is facing renewed criticism for dismissing concerns about Biden’s health in recent months.

‘We have a very bold and vibrant president in Joe Biden,’ Harris told ‘Good Morning America’ in February amid concerns about Biden’s health.

Also in February, Harris insisted, ‘Our president is in good shape, in good health, and is ready to lead in our second term.’

‘It is important we not be seduced into one of the only arguments that that side of the aisle has right now on [Biden’s cognitive decline] in a way that is intended to distract!’ Harris said in November 2023. That same month, Harris said, ‘Age is more than a chronological fact … Not only is he absolutely authoritative in rooms around the globe, but in the Oval Office.’

‘Joe Biden is gonna be fine,’ the vice president assured the public in September 2023.

‘I’m ready, if necessary, but it’s not gonna be necessary,’ Harris said in March.

The clips of Harris defending Biden resurfaced this week after the president announced roughly a month after his widely panned debate performance that he would in fact drop out of the race.

‘She lied,’ conservative communicator Steve Guest posted on X on Sunday. ‘Kamala is complicit in a coverup.’

‘Make no mistake – Kamala Harris wanted the nomination without a primary,’ former acting Director of the United States National Intelligence Ric Grenell posted on X. ‘She lied to the public about Joe’s actual health up until the last minute when a primary would be too late. She knew all along.’

Sen. JD Vance, the Republican nominee for vice president, wrote on X that Harris ‘lied for nearly four years about Biden’s mental capacity–saddling the nation with a president who can’t do the job.’

‘Kamala Harris lied to Americans for four years that Joe Biden was able to serve, sharp as a tack, fit as a fiddle,’ GOP Sen. Tom Cotton posted on X. ‘Now, she has to answer: if Joe Biden isn’t fit to run for president, do you believe that he’s fit to continue serving as president?’

‘The cover up of Biden’s condition by Democrats and the media will go down as one of the biggest scandals in American history,’ GOP Congressman Darrell Issa posted on X. 

Fox News Digital reached out to Harris’s office for comment but did not receive a response.

Days ahead of officially dropping out of the 2024 race, President Biden declared in a media interview that a medical diagnosis from a doctor would likely sway him to reconsider running for a second term. 

‘If I had some medical condition that emerged,’ Biden said, when asked in a BET interview this month if there was a reason that would make him reconsider running in 2024. ‘If doctors came to me and said, ‘You got this problem, that problem.’’

Following weeks of adamant declarations from Biden and his campaign that he was staying in the race, the president dropped out on Sunday afternoon, and shortly after endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president. 

‘My fellow Democrats, I have decided not to accept the nomination and to focus all my energies on my duties as President for the remainder of my term,’ Biden posted on X Sunday afternoon announcing his support for Harris.

‘My very first decision as the party nominee in 2020 was to pick Kamala Harris as my Vice President. And it’s been the best decision I’ve made. Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year. Democrats – it’s time to come together and beat Trump. Let’s do this,’ he continued. 

Biden is self-isolating in his home Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, after a COVID-19 diagnosis last week. He said he would address the nation with more information about his departure ‘later this week.’ 

‘Our president, Joe Biden wanted to be here today. He is feeling much better and recovering fast, and he looks forward to getting back on the road,’ Harris said Monday in her first public remarks since Biden’s departure from the race. 

For years, Biden’s health has been of concern to conservatives, including former White House doctor Ronny Jackson, before the concerns snowballed following Biden’s disastrous debate against former President Trump last month. The debate performance – which included Biden stumbling over his words, trailing off on his thoughts and answering questions in a much more subdued manner than during previous public events – opened the floodgates to legacy media outlets and Democratic allies calling on Biden to drop out over concerns about his mental fitness and age. 

Biden and the administration have hit back that Biden’s mental fitness is sound and that he does not have dementia, Parkinson’s or other diseases. Biden’s brother, however, said following Sunday’s announcement that the president’s health ‘absolutely’ played a role in his decision not to seek re-election just weeks ahead of the Democratic National Convention. 

‘I’m incredibly proud of my brother. Selfishly, I will have him back to enjoy whatever time we have left. He is a genuine hero. Country over self. Sounds corny in our cynical political environment, but he nor I are cynical. The goal remains the same, defeat Trump and continue the work that Joe has done. My hope is that our party rallies around this heroic act,’ Frank Biden told CBS News on Sunday. 

‘In my humble opinion, absolutely,’ he said when asked if his brother’s health played a role in him bowing out. 

Following Frank Biden’s comment, a source close to the Biden family told CBS that the president’s brother is an alcoholic and his claims were ‘completely untrue.’ 

‘Frank Biden suffers from alcoholism and hasn’t spoken to his brother, the president, in weeks. What he said about President Biden’s health being a factor in his decision is completely untrue,’ the source told the outlet. 

White House spokesman Andrew Bates told Fox News Digital when asked about the president’s health that it did not play a role in his decision to drop out of the race. 

‘No. Health was not a factor,’ Bates said Monday morning. 

Concerns surrounding Biden’s mental acuity stretch back to the 2020 election, when White House doctor under the Obama and Trump administrations, Ronny Jackson, sounded the alarm that he didn’t believe Biden was mentally fit for office. 

‘As a citizen, not as a candidate running for Congress, but as a citizen of this country, I’ve watched Joe Biden on the campaign trail and I am concerned and convinced that he does not have the mental capacity, the cognitive ability, to serve as our commander in chief and our head of state,’ Jackson, who is now a Republican congressman representing Texas, said in 2020. 

The concerns have mounted since, most notably in February of this year when Special Counsel Robert Hur published his report investigating the president’s handling of classified documents after his departure as vice president in the Obama administration. 

The report stated Hur would not recommend criminal charges against Biden for possessing classified materials after his vice presidency, calling Biden ‘a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.’

His mental fitness again came under scrutiny when the Wall Street Journal published a piece earlier this year based on dozens of interviews with lawmakers and administration officials who characterized Biden as losing his mental edge and showing his age in meetings. The White House slammed the article as a partisan hit piece. 

In addition to concerns over Biden’s mental acuity, he previously ​​suffered two brain aneurysms in 1988 that nearly claimed his life. 

‘If he did survive, there was a chance that the part of his brain that governed his speech would be damaged,’ newly-released book ‘American Woman,’ authored by New York Times White House correspondent Katie Rogers, reported of the 1988 health scare.

Amid mounting concerns over his mental fitness, Biden was mocked and criticized on social media for a handful of gaffes and miscues during public events in recent months. Those include: former President Obama taking Biden’s wrist to seemingly lead him offstage at a fundraiser in Los Angeles in June; Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni directing Biden back to a gaggle of world leaders in Italy this summer after he took a few steps away from the group to give a thumbs up to a parachutist; and viral video showing the president standing relatively motionless during a Juneteenth concert event at the White House. 

The floodgates for criticizing the president’s age and mental acuity opened on June 27, when he delivered his botched debate performance, with Democratic elected officials and traditional allies in political and media orbits calling on Biden to bow out of the race out of concern he could not defeat Trump. 

Biden and his campaign, however, repeatedly denied he would bow out of the race and hit back against claims his mental fitness had slipped. 

‘Joe Biden has made it more than clear: he’s in this race and he’s in it to win it. Moreover, he’s the presumptive nominee, there is no plan for an alternative nominee,’ a campaign memo released just two days before Biden dropped out read. 

Harris appears to be the likely replacement for Biden as she gains additional endorsements from heavy-hitting Democrats such as former President Clinton and Hillary Clinton.

Trump responded to the news of Biden dropping out by lambasting him as the ‘worst president’ and remarking that Harris would be an easier Democratic nominee to defeat. 

‘He is the worst president in the history of our country,’ Trump told Fox News Digital in a phone interview on Sunday afternoon. ‘There has never been a president so bad.’

‘He is not fit to serve,’ Trump continued. ‘And I ask: Who is going to be running the country for the next five months?’ 

The Democratic Party will officially nominate its candidate for president next month.