With his candidacy in doubt, Joe Biden spoke to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on Friday in one of the most important interviews of the Democratic president’s decades-long political career.
The 22-minute sit-down came a full eight days after Biden’s disastrous debate performance, in which more than 50 million people watched the 81-year-old struggle to complete sentences or answer basic questions about his campaign. Of course, far fewer people watched the ABC interview, but the audience included many elected officials, donors and political strategists who are actively deciding whether to help save or end Biden’s candidacy in the coming days. Top Biden aides have been urging elected Democrats not to publicly express their concerns.
The president and his team hope the first interview will help unite his party and provide momentum for the long road ahead. It’s unclear whether he succeeded.
Here are some key points:
Biden faces lower bar after debate
At this point, every Biden answer, interview and speech will become a Rorschach test for voters, who continue to tell pollsters they are concerned about his age. If one wants to look for more signs of trouble, it’s easy to find.
Biden performed better than he did on the debate stage. As the president talks about his record, vows not to drop out of the race and takes shots at Donald Trump, he also repeatedly describes him as a “pathological liar.” Biden also once called Trump a “born liar.”
But he needs to do more than surpass the incredibly low bar set last week on national television. The ABC interview featured several instances of awkward pauses, slurs and incoherence.
In one of the interview’s opening answers, Biden struggled to clearly explain whether he realized how bad his debate performance was because it happened in the moment. He went from getting ready to vote, to Trump’s lies during the debate, to him not blaming anyone.
Trump allies seized on another of Biden’s responses, suggesting he wasn’t sure he had rewatched his debate performance. “I don’t think so,” Biden said.
He said only “Almighty God” could persuade him to stop campaigning
When pressed repeatedly about whether he would step down, Biden gave no hint that he might bow to party pressure and drop out of the presidential race.
He refused to even consider the possibility. In fact, he offers only one exception: “If the Lord Almighty came down and told me this, I might do it.”
Even as Stephanopoulos provided him with various data points and shared “general views” from his conversations with party officials. “They’re worried about you and the country. They don’t think you can win. They want you to leave gracefully,” the reporter said.
Biden fired back.
“The vast majority of people are not where those people are,” he said. “Have you ever seen an elected official running for office not have the slightest concern?”
He took responsibility and dismissed questions about his health
The bottom line is that Biden doesn’t have a good explanation for his poor debate performance.
In the interview, he called it “a bad incident” but said there were no signs of “something more serious.” Instead, he said he just had a “bad cold.” When pressed again, he said: “I just had a bad night.”
He also doesn’t blame anyone but himself, although rumors have emerged in recent days about his staff and those coordinating his preparations.
Of course, such an answer may do little to win over those who care deeply about his physical and mental abilities. He also declined to undergo any medical testing that might further alleviate such concerns.
Specifically, Stephanopoulos asked Biden if he would agree to “an independent medical evaluation that would include neurological and cognitive testing.” Biden asked more than once when he didn’t answer directly.
“Look, I take a cognitive test every day. I take a test like this every day,” Biden said. “Everything I do. I’m not just running, I’m running the world.
This is not an easy interview
If Biden aides chose Stephanopoulos for the president’s first major post-debate interview in the hope that he would go easy on him, they were wrong.
Stephanopoulos, who served as an aide to former President Bill Clinton decades ago, asked the Democratic president tough questions and blunt facts, albeit in a soft tone.
When Biden suggested he had drawn large crowds recently, Stephanopoulos retorted: “I don’t think you want to play the crowd game. Donald Trump can draw big crowds.
Biden appeared flustered at times.
When Stephanopoulos asked him if he knew “how bad it was” during the debate, the president paused. He paused again later when Stephanopoulos asked him if he would be “putting personal interests ahead of the national interest” like Trump by staying in the race.
In another exchange, Biden asked Stephanopoulos if the polls were as accurate as before.
This was originally a rhetorical question. But the interviewer answered quickly.
“I don’t think so, but I think when you look at all the polling data right now, it shows that he’s definitely ahead in the popular vote and probably even further ahead in the battleground states,” Stephanopoulos said of Trump. “One of the other key factors is that it shows that in many battleground states, Democrats running for Senate and House are doing better than you are.”
Biden didn’t ask many other rhetorical questions.
One interview can’t repair the damage
Even before the interview ended, it was clear that winning over a party that was suddenly open to a Biden alternative four months before Election Day would take a lot more effort.
Around the same time, ABC released the first clip from the interview, and Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Ill., became the fourth Democratic congressman to call on Biden to withdraw from the race.
“To prevent complete disaster, please step down and let someone else do it,” Quigley said on MSNBC.
One Democrat who spoke on condition of anonymity said the White House and the presidential campaign have encouraged Democrats not to publicly express concerns about Biden’s viability or electability.
Another Democrat watching said they found Biden emotionally unstable and expected more calls for him to drop out of the race.
Biden declined to consider the possibility that congressional leaders could confront him in the coming days and demand that he step down. But as Stephanopoulos has said time and time again, this is a very real possibility. Earlier this week, Virginia Sen. Mark Warner reached out to other senators to discuss whether to ask Biden to withdraw from the race.
Biden called Warner “a good guy,” but also mentioned the Virginia native’s previous consideration of a presidential run.
Asked how he would feel if he ultimately lost the race next January, Biden’s answer may not inspire confidence.
“As long as I give it my all, do my best, do my best, that’s what it’s all about,” he said.
