Biden’s dire debate performance has Democrats panicking over his ability to beat Trump
Some propose president be replaced at party’s convention, casting his stumbling, sometimes incoherent showing as a ‘disaster’; VP admits ‘slow start,’ argues record more important
Above all, Joe Biden’s allies wanted him to demonstrate strength and energy on the debate stage Thursday night to help put to rest questions about the 81-year-old Democrat’s physical and mental acuity.
But on the biggest stage in US politics, Biden did not meet their modest expectations. His voice hoarse from what White House officials told reporters was a cold, Biden hurried through some of his talking points on the debate stage, stumbled over some answers, and trailed off during others.
And by the end of the 90-minute showdown, the Democratic president’s allies — party strategists and rank-and-file voters alike — descended into all-out panic following a debate performance punctuated by repeated stumbles, uncomfortable pauses, and a quiet speaking style that was often difficult to understand. Publicly and privately, Democrats questioned whether the party could or should replace him as the party’s presidential nominee against the 78-year-old former president Donald Trump this fall.
Even New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, a close associate of Biden, argued the incumbent must be replaced as a candidate in November’s election. In an op-ed titled “President Biden Is My Friend. He Must Bow Out of the Race,” Friedman wrote that the debate “made me weep. I cannot remember a more heartbreaking moment in American presidential campaign politics in my lifetime.”
Early in the debate, Biden paused as he was making a point about Medicare and tax reform and seemed to lose his train of thought.
Tax reform would create money to help “strengthen our healthcare system, making sure that we’re able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I was able to do with the, with the COVID, excuse me, with dealing with everything we had to do with,” Biden said, pausing. “We finally beat Medicare.”
Trump jabbed Biden for being incoherent, saying at one point: “I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said.”
What a line from the debate
"He did beat Medicaid, he beat it to death"
Fun Fact: These two have been eligible for Medicare for over 13 years pic.twitter.com/TjLEkQS4TF
— Nancy Pelosi Stock Tracker ♟ (@PelosiTracker_) June 28, 2024
While Biden struggled, Trump rattled off a series of well-worn falsehoods like migrants carrying out a crime wave and Democrats supporting infanticide.
About halfway through, a Democratic strategist who worked on Biden’s 2020 campaign, called it a “disaster.”
“There is no way to spin this. His performance was disqualifying,” a top Democratic fundraiser who spoke on condition of anonymity told Reuters after the event.
He predicted there would be a push for a so-called brokered convention when the Democratic National Convention is held in August to nominate Biden — referring to the process when a convention fails to choose a party nominee in the first round of voting, and delegates negotiate who should be named instead.
“I expect fundraising to dry up. Money follows enthusiasm,” the fundraiser said. “How can anyone with a straight face say ‘Donate to elect Joe.'”
Prominent Democratic lawmakers are also worried, a Congressional aide who works for a Democratic senator said. She noted her boss is “sitting with other frontline members and panicking. Let the Democratic bedwetting begin.”
“I’m not the only one whose heart is breaking right now. There’s a lot of people who watched this tonight and felt terribly for Joe Biden,” former Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill said on MSNBC. “I don’t know if things can be done to fix this.”
For now, the biggest question for Biden is whether the damage is permanent. Many voters have not yet tuned into an election that’s still more than four months away. The president and his allies are sitting on millions of dollars that have yet to be spent on advertising and swing-state infrastructure. And there’s precedent for recovering from rough debate performances, including Barack Obama’s rebound from an uneven encounter with Mitt Romney in 2012. Democrat John Fetterman went on to defeat a Republican rival in 2022 after struggling through a debate several months after experiencing a stroke.
Biden’s gamble
Biden’s 2024 reelection campaign was always based on a gamble that voters would ultimately support an 81-year-old lifelong politician with weak approval ratings in a rematch that few Americans want. Despite such liabilities, Biden’s team insisted that he was uniquely positioned to stop Trump from returning to the White House — just as he did four years ago.
They have long predicted that Biden’s winning political coalition would eventually embrace the Democratic president after being sufficiently reminded of Trump’s chaotic leadership. But there were little signs of such confidence in the wake of Biden’s underwhelming debate performance.
“It was a slow start. That’s obvious to everyone. I’m not going to debate that point,” Vice President Kamala Harris said on CNN after the debate, while stressing the president’s achievements in office. “I’m talking about the choice in November. I’m talking about one of the most important elections in our collective lifetime.”
Biden’s surrogates were slow to enter the post-debate spin room in Atlanta. And when they finally emerged, they largely avoided questions from the press. Instead, they railed against Trump’s long list of falsehoods during the debate. Among other things, Trump didn’t disavow those who attacked the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a potential future presidential candidate who was Biden’s most prominent surrogate in the Atlanta spin room, urged Democrats not to panic.
“I think it’s unhelpful. And I think it’s unnecessary. We’ve got to go in, we’ve got to keep our heads high,” Newsom said in an interview on MSNBC. “We’ve got to have the back of this president. You don’t turn back because of one performance. What kind of party does that?”
Campaign Chair Jen O’Malley Dillon contrasted Biden’s performance with Trump’s, saying he delivered “a positive and winning vision for the future of America – one in which every American has a fair shot at the American dream.”
Signs of anxiety
Still, signs of anxiety were apparent as Democrats began to openly encourage the party to find an alternative to Biden. Some party officials pointed to a social media post from former Obama campaign aide Ravi Gupta.
“Every Democrat I know is texting that this is bad,” Gupta wrote on X. “Just say it publicly and begin the hard work of creating space in the convention for a selection process. I’ll vote for a corpse over Trump, but this is a suicide mission.”
Every Democrat I know is texting that this is bad. Just say it publicly and begin the hard work of creating space in the convention for a selection process. I'll vote for a corpse over Trump, but this is a suicide mission.
— Ravi Gupta (@RaviMGupta) June 28, 2024
David Axelrod, a top strategist for former President Barack Obama, told CNN: “There are gonna be discussions on if he should continue.”
Under current Democratic Party rules, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to replace Biden as the party’s nominee without his cooperation or without the party officials being willing to rewrite its rules at the August national convention.
The president won the overwhelming majority of Democratic delegates during the state-by-state primary process. And party rules state that, “Delegates elected to the national convention pledged to a presidential candidate shall in all good conscience reflect the sentiments of those who elected them.”
But DNC rules don’t have the same strict “faithless delegate” rules that the RNC does, which ignores votes against that are in violation of a delegate’s pledged position.
Republicans, meanwhile, were giddy about Biden’s lackluster performance. But Trump’s co-campaign chief dismissed chatter about whether Democrats would try to nominate someone other than Biden.
“There’s so many political experts on X, so we’ll hear a lot from them, I’m sure, in the next few days because they’ve all run so many campaigns,” LaCivita said sarcastically. “But the only way that happens is if Joe Biden voluntarily steps down, and he’s not going to do that.”
Thursday’s debate may be imprinted on voters’ minds for the foreseeable future with Biden and Trump not scheduled to meet on the debate stage again for another 75 days.
LaCavita said Trump would be at the next debate “with bells on.” Biden campaign spokesman Kevin Munoz confirmed that Biden would also attend the rematch.
Biden looks and sounds terrible. He looks and sounds so old. So old. Trump is Trump, every word out of his mouth is bullshit. But Biden sounds old. And lost. And that’s going to matter more than anything.
So far, this is an absolute nightmare for Biden.
— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) June 28, 2024
But privately, Biden’s advisers suggested that the campaign was never going to be won or lost in one rally, conversation, or debate. They pointed at plans to maintain an aggressive schedule in the weeks and months ahead.
On Friday, Biden was scheduled to campaign in North Carolina while Harris was in Nevada.
Still, Biden supporters struggled to find any hope in the immediate aftermath of the debate.
“That was the worst performance in the history of televised presidential debates,” Tim Miller, a former Republican strategist-turned ardent Biden supporter, said in the spin room, shaking his head in disbelief.
“Trump is Trump, every word out of his mouth is bullshit. But Biden sounds old. And lost. And that’s going to matter more than anything. So far, this is an absolute nightmare for Biden,” Joe Walsh, a former 2020 Republican presidential candidate who has been critical of Trump, said on X.
