Prof. ST Hsieh
Director, US-China Energy Industry Forum
626-376-7460
November 19, 2023
It is clear that everyone wishes Joe Biden a happy 81st birthday! After all he is a nice fellow. But it is time for Joe to act as a senior leader and help/support the next generation politicians to take over as soon as possible.
No one can change one’s age, that is not a debatable issue. But one has to be realistic about the reality such as many public opinion polls as well as one’s own mental capacity or stamina. No one other than Biden knows better than his age problem. But it is also upon his family, his closet advisors as well his supporters to advise him that his time is up, it is urgent to make a decision as soon as possible. It is also up to his family and closest advisors to explain to him what are the downsides if he were to stay on this campaign and eventually lost to Trump in 2024: Biden would be classified as the most incompetent President ever (as labeled by Trump already.)
On the other hand, Biden will be always honored as the President who, not only took over Trump’s awful one-term legacy, but also who prevented the Trump II.
If you haven’t heard, the Democratic Party is full of anxious people right now. They’re worried about swing-state polls showing JOE BIDEN losing to DONALD TRUMP. They’re worried about voters panning “Bidenomics” even as the economy seems to be improving.
But the No. 1 worry at this moment is about the one thing he and his team can’t change: his advanced age.
The president turns 81 tomorrow. This morning, a pair of stories in POLITICO and WaPo explore how Biden’s campaign is under growing pressure from supporters to fashion a strategy for dealing with perhaps his greatest vulnerability in 2024.
Elena Schneider, Holly Otterbein and Jonathan Lemire open with a scene from a fundraising retreat where one donor asked the campaign how they should deal with the growing concerns about his age they keep hearing. QUENTIN FULKS , the principal deputy campaign manager, essentially told them Biden isn’t getting younger but they should turn the focus to Biden’s accomplishments.
“Even those in Biden’s inner circle, including family members, worry about the optics of age. Those close allies believe that Biden is mentally up for the job, but some acknowledge that the president can at times appear frail, according to two people involved in the conversations but not authorized to speak publicly about internal deliberations.
“One example: As noted on his recent physical, Biden’s gait has stiffened following foot fractures he suffered playing with his dog in late 2020. People close to the president have discussed having him walk shorter distances while on camera. They’ve also advocated, at times, trading in formal shoes for more comfortable ones — both to make his stride seem less stiff, but also to reduce the risk of falls.”
RON KLAIN , Biden’s first chief of staff and most ardent defender in the press: “I think everyone knows it’s an issue, and we have to address it. … He’ll keep on doing the job, campaigning with vigor and demonstrating to the American people his energy level, which is quite robust.”
But one anonymous donor had this to say of the campaign: “I think the strategy is not to even address it, to consider questions like that stupid or silly. Literally everyone is talking about it, even amongst donors. But the response is always: ‘What are you going to do?’”
WaPo’s Ashley Parker, Tyler Pager and Michael Scherer also address Biden’s age at the top of their piece but go broader in an account based on interviews with 30 Democrats inside and outside the campaign.
“The central concern is that Biden … has lost a step and is showing visible signs of aging. He has struggled to sell his economic accomplishments. And there are worries that his campaign, so far devoid of major events or organizing efforts, is not doing enough to deal with the public hand-wringing over his chances or the coming threat of Trump, 77.”
There are other sources of Democratic anxiety that the piece explores:
- “Some argue that neither Biden nor his team have effectively communicated a reelection plan, a second-term governing vision or a clear argument against Trump.”
- “Democrats have also expressed concern about the campaign’s thin operation in battleground states. Outside of pilot programs for organizing in Arizona and Wisconsin, the campaign has not built on the Democratic National Committee’s presence in key states or placed staff in any of the early primary states.”
The White House and campaign “largely dismissed the concerns as unjustified agita, reminiscent of the criticism Biden’s campaign faced in 2020 and former president BARACK OBAMA’s reelection campaign underwent in the fall of 2011. They argue that the current polling does not capture the likely outcome of an election, which will only come into focus once voters engage next year with the possibility of another Trump term in the White House.”
We chatted with some Biden world folks this morning and got a similar response. Here’s what one said: “The campaign can either build a campaign that is knee-jerk responsive to the same Washington sources that were wrong in ’20 and ’22, or they can put in the historic time and money they are right now to mobilize their coalition to win a year from now. Personally, I think a strategy centered on voters — not Washington — is the right one.”
Related read … Maureen Dowd: “The Axe is Sharp,” in which DAVID AXELROD says of Biden: “I think he has a 50-50 shot here, but no better than that, maybe a little worse.”
By the numbers: In the latest set of brutal polls for Biden, EPIC-MRA finds him losing to Trump by 5 points in Michigan. And an NBC survey clocks his national approval rating at a record low of 40% — including a 15-point plummet since September among young voters — and losing to Trump for the first time ever in their polling.