The White House was engaged in frantic damage control on Wednesday as the crisis surrounding Biden’s presidency deepened.
Biden’s aides, both in the White House and on the campaign trail, have been trying to quash damaging reports almost hourly before new blood is shed from a president badly hurt since his disastrous defeat at last Thursday’s debate in Atlanta.
Asked at a White House press conference on Wednesday whether Biden was considering dropping out of the Democratic nomination, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said “absolutely not.”
Hours earlier, The New York Times had reported that Biden had told an unnamed ally that he was considering whether to continue in the campaign.
Jean-Pierre said his communications staff had asked the president for clarification on this point.
“The president said that’s absolutely false. This is something he said directly to me,” Jean-Pierre claimed.
White House senior deputy press secretary Andrew Bates disputed subsequent reports suggesting Biden had “informally acknowledged” that the next few days were crucial to his political survival.
“It is false to suggest that this could end the campaign,” Bates said on social media.
Whatever the White House or the Biden campaign says about the details, there’s no denying the widespread Democratic panic sparked by last Thursday’s debate.
Meanwhile, some of the Biden team’s response, such as its lackluster response to providing one-on-one assurances to congressional leaders, have infuriated Democrats.
Biden spoke by phone with key Democrats in Congress and met in person with Democratic governors on Wednesday night.
Afterwards, three of the attendees – Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and New York Gov. Kathy Hockal – gave brief addresses to reporters outside the West Building in the evening sun.
The key message, repeated verbatim by both Moore and Hawkle, is that Biden is “in it to win.”
When asked by a reporter if he thought Biden was “fit for the presidency,” Waltz said he did.
“No one will deny that we performed poorly Thursday night, but that doesn’t impact my belief,” Waltz added.
But even this seemingly reassuring moment marked another example of how difficult it is for the Biden team to gain control of the case.
This came as Governor Walz offered yet another explanation for the disastrous performance at the presidential debate in Atlanta, saying the President told governors they focused too much on the details at the expense of the bigger picture.
The Minnesota governor said Biden told state governors he was “concerned about the numbers.” [when] It’s about people, it’s about their lives.’” Waltz described it as “thoughts that come up in my head.”
This was at least the third explanation for Biden’s misstep — the other two were that he had a cold and was fatigued from an international trip that actually ended nearly two weeks before the debate.
The meeting with state governors offered Biden a ray of light in a dark tunnel. But elsewhere, his troubles have multiplied.
Rep. Raul Grijalva (R-Ariz.) became the second House Democrat to call on the president to step down, following Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) on Tuesday.
Grijalva told The New York Times that he would support Biden if he remained the nominee, but cast the crisis as an “opportunity to look elsewhere” and said Biden “has to take responsibility for keeping the seat, and part of that responsibility is to withdraw from this race.”
A third House Democrat, Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, stepped forward to call for Biden to step down but stopped short of crossing the line.
In a statement, Moulton said he respected “all the great things” Biden had accomplished, but added that he had “serious concerns about his ability to defeat Donald Trump.”
The same sentiment was heard across the Democratic Party, which is in a collective panic about the possibility of Biden losing the White House to Trump, and many Democrats see Trump as a particular danger to American civilian life.
Wednesday’s poll added to that panic.
A New York Times/Siena College poll found that Trump has a 6-point lead among voters nationwide, doubling his lead since a poll by the same organization just before the debate.
A Wall Street Journal poll found that Trump’s approval rating among registered voters had risen by 6 points, up 4 points since February. The Journal poll also found, surprisingly, that 4 in 5 voters believe Biden is too old to seek a second term.
Those two polls also showed Trump with a 6-point lead in a CNN/SSRS poll conducted the previous day, but the margin was unchanged from the previous poll in April.
If Biden withdraws, he will become the first sitting president to abandon his reelection bid since President Lyndon Johnson in 1968.
Such a move would also throw the party into new turmoil, a point Biden’s allies have repeatedly made to ensure his survival.
Without Biden, Vice President Harris would be the obvious successor, but there is no guarantee she will be nominated, and as her critics point out, her poll numbers don’t suggest she has a solid lead over Trump.
Democrats have quietly been urging Biden to do more public events to show that the Atlanta debate was an exception.
Of course, there is a risk that a major failure or error could lead to the end of the road.
He has several such appearances planned for the coming days, including an interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos on Friday, scheduled campaign appearances in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and a promised news conference at the NATO summit in Washington next week.
Biden’s future is uncertain. The next few days may decide his fate.
This note is a reporting column by Niall Stanage.
