Analysis: Biden tries but fails to change the rising tide against his re-election

No president has ever needed a public holiday like Joe Biden needs the Fourth of July. Biden is frantically fighting to save his political career by escalating resistance. But he is in danger of being swallowed up by a rising tide against him, as more Democrats express doubts that he can beat Donald Trump after a disastrous debate performance.

The president will meet with family members, who will be critical to his future deliberations on his re-election campaign, at the White House for Independence Day – urgently needing a calm news day that allows him to regroup for possibly the next 48 hours. criticism of his political career.

As speculation exploded Wednesday that he might be considering dropping out of the race, Biden declared unequivocally that he was in the running to win. He then met with 20 Democratic governors at the White House to try to prove he has the energy and acuity to win and lead for another four years.

On Friday (5), Biden will give an interview to ABC News, which now presents itself as an even greater challenge than the debate on CNNgiven the need for an agile and forceful performance to correct the previous impression.

Biden’s campaign stops in swing states will, like all his public appearances now, be scrutinized for any slip-up or sign of vulnerability that supports the impression he created for himself on the debate stage of a weakened leader.

“I’m running. I am the candidate of the Democratic Party. No one is forcing me to leave. I’m not leaving,” Biden told his startled campaign team in a phone call Wednesday as he sought an elusive comeback.

Now, it’s the time zone that was the problem

But the stark emerging reality for the president is that the reassurances, shifting explanations and spin that his political advisers have put forward so far are not working — because there may be no answer to his dilemma.

The image of an incoherent, weak and struggling president was seared into the minds of 50 million television viewers a week ago. And even a much more competent damage control effort than that mounted by the White House and the Biden campaign would have struggled to erase that impression.

Attempts to explain his struggles in Atlanta are only returning attention to the central problem: Most voters doubt he is fit to serve a new term that would end when he is 86.

On Wednesday, for example, the White House adopted Biden’s line that he had jet lag syndrome after two trips to Europe in early June. Given that the president had already been back on U.S. soil for more than a week at the time of the debate, this only raised new questions about whether he is up to the onerous demands of the presidency — which often requires extensive travel.

The idea that the jet lag — in combination with the cold that aides said he also had — caused Biden to get lost in mid-sentence and fail to make a coherent case on core issues of his campaign, and did nothing to stop his political downfall.

And it meant that Wednesday was another day when the focus was on Biden’s crumbling campaign rather than the grave threat to US democracy and political freedoms that the president warns Trump poses.

At the end of a day of stinging jabs at the president, a senior administration official told CNN that the gradual erosion of his support among Democrats was like “waves crashing onto the shore.” The official added: “First are the donors. Then there are the elected officials. Now it will be the research. It just breaks the resistance.”

Things started off badly for Biden on Wednesday and only got worse

A second Democratic elected official spoke anonymously and asked Biden to leave the re-election campaign. Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Arizona told The New York Times that he would support Biden if he were the nominee, but that “this is an opportunity to look elsewhere.”

He added: “What he needs to do is take responsibility for maintaining that position – and part of that responsibility is to get out of this race.” While few other lawmakers have been as outspoken, there are many more who share the views of Grijalva and Texas Rep. Lloyd Doggett, who spoke out Tuesday.

A new poll has bad news for Biden. A New York Times/Siena College poll found that Trump now leads 49% to 43% among likely voters nationally, gaining a three-point swing from a week before the debate.

At CNN Poll of Polls, the former president leads by five points (49% to 44%, in head-to-head polls conducted entirely after last Thursday’s presidential debate). Candidates who win debates often have a rise in the polls that then declines. But Biden entered the confrontation behind and needed to win. Instead, he is heading in the opposite direction after blowing his best chance to reset the race.

White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre faced yet another rocky ride in the press room as she offered a new explanation for why Biden performed so poorly in Atlanta, which she insisted was not an excuse.

“What I mean is, it’s the jet lag and also the cold, right?” she said. “These are both things that happened, and you heard it in his voice when he gave the debate.”

Biden launched a round of calls with top Democratic leaders, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn, and his friend, Delaware Senator Chris Coons.

He also recorded two radio interviews that will air this Thursday (4) in swing states, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. And he also welcomed Democratic governors to the White House. Two, Tim Walz of Minnesota and Wes Moore of Maryland, offered him a boost with supportive comments to reporters.

But Moore, a rising star in the Democratic Party, also said: “We have always believed that when you love someone, you tell the truth. And I think we went in and were honest about the feedback we were getting. We’ve been honest about the concerns we’re hearing from people.”

Another governor – and possible alternative candidate – Gavin Newsom, from California, said in a note to CNN that Biden was “fully committed. And so am I. Joe Biden supported us. Now it’s time to support him.”

There is no sign that the feelings are not genuine. But there is also no political incentive for any powerful Democratic Party figure with an eye on the future to risk being seen as destabilizing an already wounded president. Several potential alternative candidates, including Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and Vice President Kamala Harris, were at Biden’s meetings with governors.

Some top Democrats in the House said it was time for the president to step aside, in a call with the chamber’s party leadership, reported CNN. But some members were also concerned about the frenzy that could arise if the president left and left a power vacuum on the presidential ticket.

There were early signs Wednesday that the Trump campaign is calibrating how far the former president would need to shift his strategy if Biden abandons his reelection bid. Campaign co-chairs Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles issued a statement warning that any replacement could expect to be hammered for hiding “the truth from the American public” about Biden’s condition.

“Every single one of them has lied about Joe Biden’s cognitive state and supported his disastrous policies over the past four years, especially giggling co-pilot Kamala Harris,” they wrote.

Biden’s passionate pledges to stay in the race appeared to be a response to reporting in The New York Times and the CNN that the president understands that the next few days are critical and could end his campaign.

The White House and the campaign said the reports were false. But any sign that Biden is wavering could be disastrous for campaigns on the ground in swing states. If Biden leaves, he will likely insist he is in until the final moments.

A CNN reported that a succession plan is taking shape that could see the president immediately throw his support, his campaign fund and his delegates to the vice president to avoid a nomination fight that could divide the party.

Biden’s new reality was on display in the afternoon when he presided over a ceremony to posthumously award the Medal of Honor to two Civil War soldiers. The event was broadcast live on cable television, in a sign that the president’s every move between now and November will be filtered through the prism of his debate failure and analyzed for new signs of failing faculties.

Another problem for Biden is that key Democratic Party figures who continue to support the president are making clear that he must do more to reshape public perception of his capabilities and are not ruling out the possibility of him dropping out of the race.

“We’re going to trust him to make the right decision about the crossroads we’re at right now,” Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin told CNN. And Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell summed up the critical days ahead for Biden when she warned, “He has a very short amount of time to speak to the American people.”

This content was originally created in English.

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