President Biden Vows to Defeat Donald Trump In US Election
President Joe Biden affirmed on Friday his commitment to defeating Republican rival Donald Trump in the upcoming November presidential election, dismissing any notion of withdrawing from the race.
Biden’s comments came in the wake of a lackluster debate performance that left many Democrats disheartened.
“I know I’m not a young man, to state the obvious,” the 81-year-old president said at a rally, addressing concerns about his age and capabilities. “I don’t walk as easy as I used to; I don’t speak as smoothly as I used to; I don’t debate as well as I used to,” he admitted, as the crowd responded with chants of “Four more years.”
Despite the challenges, Biden expressed unwavering confidence in his ability to lead.
“I would not be running again if I didn’t believe with all my heart and soul that I could do this job. The stakes are too high,” he declared.
Biden’s performance, marked by verbal slips and meandering responses, has heightened voter concerns about his fitness for another term, prompting some Democrats to question his candidacy for the November 5 election.
However, campaign spokesperson Michael Tyler dismissed any discussions about replacing Biden, stating, “We’d rather have one bad night than a candidate with a bad vision for where he wants to take the country.”
To reassure staffers, the campaign held an “all-hands-on-deck” meeting on Friday, emphasizing that Biden was not dropping out, according to sources familiar with the meeting.
While Trump, 78, propagated several falsehoods during the debate, post-debate discussions focused on Biden, particularly among Democrats.
Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic Party leader in the U.S. House of Representatives, avoided directly addressing whether he still had faith in Biden’s candidacy, saying, “I support the ticket.
I support the Senate Democratic majority. We will do everything possible to take back the House in November.”
Other Democrats were similarly non-committal. “That’s the president’s decision,” said Democratic Senator Jack Reed in an interview with a local TV station in Rhode Island.
However, senior figures in the party, including former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, expressed their continued support for Biden. “Bad debate nights happen.
Trust me, I know. But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and somebody who only cares about himself,” Obama wrote on X.
Contrastingly, the New York Times editorial board, which endorsed Biden in 2020, called on him to withdraw from the race to improve the Democratic Party’s chances against Trump by selecting another candidate.
“The greatest public service Mr. Biden can now perform is to announce that he will not continue to run for re-election,” the editorial stated.
In response, the Biden campaign announced it raised $14 million on Thursday and Friday, with its single best hour of fundraising occurring immediately after the Thursday night debate. The Trump campaign reported raising $8 million on the debate night
