WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden told NBC News in an interview on Monday that it was a “mistake” to say he wanted to hit Republican nominee Donald Trump, but argued that his opponent’s rhetoric was more incendiary in warning that Trump remained a threat to democratic institutions.
Those comments from Biden came during a private call with donors last week, as the Democrat struggled to bolster his imperiled candidacy with the party’s core constituencies. During that conversation, Biden declared that he was “done” talking about his poor debate performance and that it was “time to put Trump on target,” saying that Trump has received too little scrutiny over his positions, rhetoric and lack of campaigning.
The NBC interview came as Biden and his re-election team prepared to resume campaigning at full steam after a brief pause following the weekend assassination attempt on Trump. The president and his campaign unleashed a barrage of criticism after the Republican candidate announced freshman Sen. JD Vance of Ohio as his running mate.
“He’s a Trump clone on these issues,” Biden told reporters as he headed to Nevada for a series of speeches and campaign events. “I don’t see any difference.”
As soon as Vance was chosen as Trump’s vice president, Biden’s campaign sent out a fundraising request signed by the president, and his team issued a scathing statement, saying he chose the freshman senator because he would “bend over backwards to allow Trump and his extreme MAGA agenda. In turn, Vice President Kamala Harris called Vance to congratulate him and left him a voicemail, according to a person familiar with the matter.
And to NBC anchor Lester Holt, Biden made it clear he would keep the focus on Trump. Although he acknowledged his “mistake,” Biden nevertheless said that he is “not the guy who said he wanted to be a dictator from day one” and that he wanted the focus to be on what Trump was saying. It is Trump, not Biden, who engages in this type of rhetoric, Biden said, referring to Trump’s past comments about a “bloodbath” if the Republican loses to Biden in November.
“Look, how do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real, when a president says things like he does?” Biden said. “You just don’t say anything because you might incite someone?”
The NBC interview, scheduled before the attempt on Trump’s life at a rally in Pennsylvania, was part of Biden’s broader strategy to prove his fitness for office after anguish grew among Democrats over his disastrous performance in the debate on June 27th.
Biden’s campaign recalibrated some of its political plans in the wake of Saturday’s assassination attempt, taking advertising offline and pausing messaging. The White House also canceled Biden’s planned Monday visit to the Lyndon B. Johnson Library, where he was scheduled to deliver remarks on civil rights.
Biden also spoke privately with Trump after the assassination attempt, a call the president described in the NBC interview as “very cordial.”
“I told him how worried I was and wanted to make sure I knew how he was really doing,” Biden said. “He looked fine. He said he was fine and thanked me for calling. I told him he was literally in Jill and I’s prayers, and I hoped his entire family was bearing with this.”
It has not yet been determined when Biden’s campaign ads will be broadcast again. But Biden is proceeding with the Nevada portion of his previously scheduled move west, which will include remarks to the NAACP and UnidosUS, a Latino advocacy and civil rights group. He will also headline what was billed as a “community campaign event” on Wednesday in Las Vegas.
Biden acknowledged that his candidacy and agenda will be under attack in Republican National Convention this week, and aides have not felt the need to completely halt his campaign, especially while Biden is under scrutiny in Milwaukee.
Asked whether Biden would adjust his message this week in light of the assassination attempt, O’Malley Dillon pointed to his Oval Office speech as a “roadmap for the entire country,” which she said was no different from Biden’s broader message since the beginning of your candidacy.
“You will hear the president continue to make his affirmative agenda clear,” she said. “Not just in abstract terms, but very specifically about how it continues to help the American people against this very negative point of view and extreme agenda that the American people have already said they don’t want.”
Biden’s renewed campaign this week comes as Democrats are deadlocked over whether the incumbent president should remain in the race, even as he challenges his retention. Biden has made it clear in no uncertain terms that he remains in the race, and aides have operated as such.
It was unclear whether the attempt on Trump’s life would undermine Democratic efforts to urge Biden to step aside, but it appears to have stalled some of the momentum for now. No Democrat has called on him to drop out of the race since the Saturday night shooting.
In the hours before the shooting, Biden was still facing frustration and skepticism from Democratic lawmakers. Representative Jared Huffman of California said he asked the president during his meeting with the Congressional Progressive Caucus for an objective assessment of the race’s trajectory, and if the Lord Almighty does not intervene, Biden would consider “the best earthly alternative”: finding reached out to former Presidents Obama and Clinton, Democratic leadership, including Rep. Hakeem Jeffries and Sen. Chuck Schumer, and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, “to seek their counsel.”
Huffman said in a social media post that Biden “disagrees with the notion that we are on a losing trajectory.”
And although Biden expressed a “willingness to listen” to other voices, Huffman said he doubted any of them would be persuasive. “I continue to believe that a major course correction is needed and that the President and his team have not yet fully acknowledged the problem, much less corrected it,” he said.
But now, several Democrats who requested anonymity were skeptical that there would be enough motivation among lawmakers to try to pressure Biden not to run, especially because they are scattered and away from Washington until next week and because Biden has said he will not step in. aside and took the opportunity to quickly respond to the shooting over the weekend. People requested anonymity to characterize private conversations.
Asked by Holt whether he has weathered the worst in his own party, Biden responded that 14 million Democratic voters selected him in the primaries and added: “I hear them.” His mental acuity is “very good,” Biden added, but said the question about his age was “legitimate” to ask.
Many in the Democratic Party looked to Congressional leaders Jeffries and Schumer to express their concerns directly to the president. Jeffries met with Biden at the White House on Thursday night, while Schumer went to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, on Saturday for her visit with Biden, which occurred shortly before Trump’s assassination attempt.
There were still deep concerns that Biden is not up to the job and a sense that the pressure to try to find another candidate could increase again when lawmakers return to Washington. Congressional Democrats watched the Republican National Convention and Biden’s appearances this week with the awareness that the dynamics could shift — again.
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AP Congressional Correspondent Lisa Mascaro and AP White House Correspondent Zeke Miller contributed to this report.
