If United States President Joe Biden is going to survive pressure to abandon his re-election campaign after a poor showing in his debate with Donald Trump, he needs to ace a gauntlet of events in the coming days.
As calls grow from some of his own Democrats to step aside, and support coalesces around the idea of Vice President Kamala Harris taking his place in the November election, Biden needs to demonstrate stamina and mental acuity to voters and donors.
Biden will host families at the annual July 4 Independence Day festivities at the White House on Thursday, be interviewed on ABC News on Friday, and travel to Wisconsin the same day for a campaign rally with hundreds of supporters.
On Sunday, Biden and his wife Jill speak to thousands at the National Education Association in Pennsylvania. Next week he hosts dozens of world leaders at the Nato summit in Washington and holds a rare solo news conference. He has also done several radio interviews.
Dozens of House Democrats are watching closely, prepared to ask Biden to step aside if he falters in the ABC interview, a source told Reuters.
In a radio interview with WURD that aired on Thursday morning, Biden spoke about his record delivering for Black Americans as president. He stuttered occasionally.
Asked whether there was any reason for the American people to be concerned after his halting performance in last week’s debate with Trump, Biden demurred.
“No, I had a bad debate,” he said, adding that this should not erase what he’s done as president for three and a half years.
He recited multiple statistics on issues ranging from funding for historically Black colleges and universities to student loan relief. He reiterated his case against Trump.
“The guy I’m running against is a convicted felon who is, said he wants to be a dictator on Day One. Not a joke, he means it,” Biden said.
Biden’s already shaky standing in opinion polls against Trump took a slight hit after the debate in Atlanta, but a new Reuters/Ipsos poll showed Biden pulled even with Trump this week, a sign the contest remains close.
Trump, 78, and Biden each had 40 per cent support among registered voters in the two-day poll that concluded on Tuesday. A prior Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted June 11-12 showed Trump with a marginal two percentage point lead, 41pc to 39pc.
Biden is 81 and would be 86 when his second term ends. He is being asked by some former supporters to step aside to preserve his legacy and lessen the chances of a second Trump presidency.
In an interview with Earl Ingram of ‘The Earl Ingram Show’ radio programme on Wednesday, Biden said he would fight on.
“I screwed up, I made a mistake. That’s 90 minutes on stage. Look what I’ve done for the last three and a half years,” he said.
Biden met with a group of Democratic governors on Wednesday at the White House to make his case. Some told reporters afterwards they were sticking by his side.
“President Joe Biden is in it to win it,” New York Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul told reporters after the talks.
Maryland Democratic Governor Wes Moore said: “We know that we have work to do. It’s going to take all of us to make it happen.”
Gavin Newsom, the California governor whose name is often floated as an alternative to Biden, said on X that he was “all in” for Biden.
Arizona’s Raul Grijalva called for Biden to drop out of the race while Representative Seth Moulton from Massachusetts pointed to Biden’s age as a liability.
“The unfortunate reality is that the status quo will likely deliver us President Trump,” Moulton said in a statement. “President Biden is not going to get younger.”
Meanwhile, Trump’s campaign and some of his allies have launched a pre-emptive political strike on Harris, moving swiftly to try to discredit her amid talk among some of her fellow Democrats that she might replace Biden atop the party’s 2024 presidential ticket.
On social media and in a flurry of statements over the past 48 hours, Trump’s campaign and his Republican allies appear to be laying the groundwork for an all-out assault on Harris should the 81-year-old Biden decide to end his re-election bid following his feeble debate performance last week.
While Biden has insisted he is not quitting the race four months before the November 5 election, and Harris has stood firmly behind him, the Trump campaign has little to lose by attacking the vice president now, so if Harris does emerge as the nominee, she might do so in a weakened state.
Republicans have regularly criticised Harris, 59, during Biden’s term in office, but the attacks this week represented a sharp and seemingly coordinated escalation that appeared to be linked to increased talk about her possibly replacing Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate.
The National Republican Congressional Committee, which oversees House Republican races, called her Biden’s “enabler in chief.”
MAGA Inc, a fundraising super PAC supporting Trump, meanwhile released a statement calling her the “invasion czar”. In March 2021, Biden said Harris would lead efforts with Mexico and Central American nations to address illegal immigration.
Republicans have since seized on that to accuse her of failing to stem the flow of millions of migrants crossing illegally into the US, although she was never directly responsible for securing the southern border.
“Kamala Harris is incompetent. She’s proven to be the weakest, worst vice president in history, and she has 100pc supported Joe Biden in every single disastrous policy that he has implemented over the last four years,” said Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for the Trump campaign.
The Biden campaign pushed back against the escalating Republican criticism without addressing the question of whether the vice president is waiting in the wings.
“Vice President Harris is proud to be President Biden’s running mate,” said Rhyan Lake, a campaign spokesperson for Harris. “No matter what false attacks Trump and his extreme allies make, she will continue to defend the Biden-Harris record and prosecute the case against Donald Trump.”
The swipes at Harris by Trump’s camp were reminiscent of a similar tactic that the Republican Trump, president from 2017-2021, used to successfully undermine Ron DeSantis, his main Republican rival, before the Florida governor jumped into their party’s 2024 election primary race last year.
Corey Lewandowski, a longtime Trump adviser, told Reuters that Harris was politically vulnerable given her role in addressing illegal immigration, among other issues that are part of extensive research the party has gathered on her record.
A former senior staffer in the Trump White House who is still in contact with the Trump campaign said the newfound emphasis on Harris made sense.
“If Joe Biden stays on top of the ticket, given what we’ve seen, she takes on even more importance. But if he does step aside, she’s the potential candidate. This is about defining her,” the staffer said, pointing to her low approval ratings in public opinion polls.
Despite her consistently low approval ratings, a Reuters/Ipsos poll earlier this week showed Harris to be as formidable an opponent to Trump as Biden. In a hypothetical matchup, Trump led Harris by a single percentage point, 43pc to 42pc.
The clamour by Trump’s allies is in stark contrast with the unusual silence from the normally voluble former president. Since Biden’s poor debate performance, Trump has laid low, making few public appearances or public statements.
“This shows a maturation of the candidate himself. You can teach an old dog new tricks. He’s showing increased discipline and message control,” said a senior adviser to the Trump campaign familiar with internal discussions.
Even before the June 27 debate, the Trump campaign was beginning to turn its attention to Harris, releasing an attack ad online that mocked her for repeating lines in her speeches.
An online meme promoted by Republicans showed Harris repeating the same phrase “unburdened by what has been” again and again in remarks.
Harris’ defenders say she has become more of a target because of her leading role in attacking Trump over abortion rights and her vigorous defence of Biden on the campaign trail.
If Biden were to exit the race before the Democratic National Convention in August, there is no guarantee Harris would be the nominee. But as vice president, she likely would be first in line. She would benefit from Biden’s immense campaign war chest and likely see a large segment of Democrats rally around her in a bid to avoid a bitter intra-party battle.
And as the first Black vice president in US history, she provides a bridge to the party’s most dependable voting bloc. Her background and relative youth would make for a sharp contrast with Trump, 78.
