In an interview with NBC, Biden bristled at continued questions about his age and abilities
Biden admits he was on the horse for three years, but can be judged on what he learned from his first debate with Donald Trump
But he repeatedly directed blame back at Trump and his own comments, from his first campaign for president in 2016 to remarks about the Jan. 6 insurrection.
I do not want to be a dictator on the first day. Biden said that he was not the guy who refused to accept the outcome of the election.
Asked if he had done soul-searching about whether his own words could incite violence, Biden said it was Trump who had used inflammatory language — not him.
Biden told his predecessor that he was in the prayers of his wife and he spoke with Trump after the shooting.
“I’m on the horse!” Biden said, describing the flurry of events he has done since the debate to try to show it was just one bad night. “Where have you been? I had 22 major events and thousands of people. A lot’s happening.”
Holt suggested to Biden that he might be willing to debate Trump again before an agreed-upon second debate in September.
“But I’m only three years older than Trump, No. 1. My mental acuity was pretty darn good. In 312 years, I have gotten more done than anyone else. I’m willing to be judged on that.”
The Day after the Assassination of President Donald J. Biden and the Reionization of the First Night of the Republican National Convention
The calls from Democrats in Congress for Biden to withdraw from the presidential race have stopped after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump.
As the first night of the Republican National Convention unfolded, President Biden sat for a new televised interview where he pushed back when asked about whether he needed to do more to convince his party that he’s got what it takes to run for a second term.
In the aftermath of the June 27 debate, I was certain that this was not simply a bad night and that there would be serious damage done to his standing with voters because of his inability to serve. At the same time, with so many of Mr. Biden’s voters fiercely opposed to Mr. Trump returning to power, I suggested that we might actually not see polls move too much. I wrote that Mr. Biden could be inoculated from a sudden polling decline of more than a few points because of the way our current deep polarization has frozen our politics.
Meanwhile, many Democrats are despondent. There were concerns about President Biden’s hopes before the weekend happened. Mr Biden has a lot on his campaign trail to contend with. Democrats have concerns that they have no good options and only a slow march towards defeat due to the images of Mr. Trump, fist in the air.
As Republicans head into the second day of their convention in Milwaukee, they are energized. They feel jubilant about their chances of winning in November and furious about the near-assassination of former President Donald Trump — an event many of them view as the natural consequence of what they see as hyperbolic rhetoric about the threat Mr. Trump poses to the country.
