Top advisers to President Biden’s campaign commented on Friday on the widespread speculation surrounding the 2024 presidential election.
The first explanation came from campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon, who left no room for doubt in an interview with MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
“The president is in this race,” O’Malley Dillon told the hosts. “You’ve heard him say that many times, and I think last night we really saw why, because Donald Trump is not offering anything new to the American people. He’s the same guy he was in 2020. He’s the same guy he was in the debates.”
Sources close to Biden ‘infuriated’ by growing calls to quit race: Report
Jen O’Malley Dillon, a top adviser to the Biden campaign, follows President Joe Biden (not pictured) on the South Lawn of the White House before boarding Marine One in Washington, DC. (Getty Images)
O’Malley Dillon made it clear there was no doubt that Biden was “more committed than ever to defeating Donald Trump,” again denying weeks of leaks and speculation that the president was on the verge of dropping out of the race.
“In this race, we believe we are prepared and able to move forward in a close election,” O’Malley Dillon continued, “The president is the leader of our campaign and our country, and we believe that our impression, what we’ve built and our engagement with voters makes him the best person to take on Donald Trump, to prosecute the case and to present a different vision than what we saw last night.”
That firm statement was complicated a few hours later by Sen. Chris Coons (D-Delaware), co-chairman of Biden’s reelection campaign, who said “the president is considering what he needs to consider.”
Regarding Biden’s confusion, Trump campaign says Democrats haven’t even thought about who should be their nominee.
President Joe Biden speaks at the 115th NAACP National Convention in Las Vegas, Nevada. (AP Photo/David Becker)
“We’re not going to let it go,” Coons told reporters on a panel at the Aspen Institute’s Aspen Security Forum. Biden is considering it “Who is the best candidate to win the election in November and advance the values and priorities of the Democratic Party in this race?”
He noted that Biden attended a NATO summit in Washington, D.C. this month after his “very poor debate performance” and that the president “held press conferences, campaigned, held rallies.”
“And there are still those who say he’s not strong enough or competent enough to be the next president,” he continued. “I don’t think so.”
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Sen. Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware and an ally of Biden, told reporters that the president was “considering what his priorities are” at the moment, but later added: [Biden] 100%. (Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“There’s a lot of concern and anxiety about this because the stakes are high,” Kuhn said. “The outcome of this election is crucial.”
Coons walked back his somewhat shaky comments a few hours later in a social media post saying he fully supported Biden’s reelection effort.
“I fully support the president. He told me he’s in this race to win,” Coons wrote on social media platform X. “I support the president 100% because I know he can beat Trump, just like he did last time.”
