Biden allies rally behind him with a public show of support as he spends family time at Camp David
WASHINGTON — While President Joe Biden was out of sight at Camp David on Sunday spending time with family, prominent Democrats rallied in a public show of unwavering support for his campaign after his unstable debate performance And growing fear on whether he should remain in the race for the White House.
“I don’t believe Joe Biden has a problem leading for the next four years,” said a close ally, Democratic Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina. “Joe Biden must continue to build on his record.”
Biden’s allies blanketed the talk shows on Sunday, admitting that the president’s debate performance against Republican Donald Trump on Thursday night ranged from sub-par to poor. They encouraged voters to look past the moment, look at Biden’s long-term record and focus on Trump’s numerous falsehoods during the 90-minute debate.
But privately, Biden’s campaign has worked to calm concerns about the debate on CNN, where Biden sounded hoarse and at times couldn’t finish his sentences. The campaign has since worked to retain donors and surrogates.
After a fundraising event in New York on Saturday, Biden traveled with his family to Camp David, the presidential retreat outside Washington. The previously planned trip was also used to take family photos for the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August.
Even before the debate, the 81-year-old Democratic president’s age was a liability to votersand the primetime showdown appeared to amplify deep-seated public concerns for perhaps the largest audience he will muster in the four months leading up to Election Day. CNN said more than 51 million people watched the debate.
Sen. Rafael Warnock, a Democrat and Baptist minister from Georgia, said there were “more than a few Sundays when I wish I had given a better sermon,” and he pointed the experience to Biden’s performance during the debate.
“But after the sermon was over, my job was to embody the message, to stand up for the people I serve. And that’s what Joe Biden has done his entire life,” Warnock said, echoing the message from other supporters that Biden had had a bad debate but a lifetime of good governance.
During the debate, Warnock, like Clyburn and others, focused on Trump’s many falsehoods — falsehoods that Biden and the debate moderators often couldn’t verify from the stage — including Trump’s Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol supporters, immigration and the outcome of the 2020 election.
“Every time his mouth moved, he lied,” Warnock said of Trump.
Trump ally Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., dodged questions about Trump’s false claims and praised Trump’s performance while accusing the national news media of covering up a debilitating condition.
Trump “was strong. He was clear. He was coherent,” Graham said.
He called Biden “compromised” and said “the media is covering it up.”
Behind closed doors, some Democrats grew concerned that Biden’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee were not taking the impact of Biden’s actions seriously enough.
DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison and Biden’s campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez held a call Saturday afternoon with dozens of committee members across the country — a group of some of the party’s most influential members — in which they offered a rosy assessment of the path forward and others on the call were not given an opportunity to respond with questions.
Several committee members who participated in the conversation, most of whom wished to remain anonymous to discuss the private conversation, said they felt they were being asked to ignore a serious problem.
“There were a number of things that could have been said to address the situation. But we weren’t told. We were manipulated,” said Joe Salazar, an elected DNC member from Colorado who was on the call. Being manipulated or deceived is a term for “gaslit.”
Supporters like Clyburn, whose support was crucial to Biden’s 2020 South Carolina primary, pointed to the president’s rally in North Carolina on Friday, when he looked energetic and animated, a sharp turn from the night before.
“I know I’m not a young man — to state the obvious,” Biden said at the meeting. ‘Folks, I no longer walk as easily as I used to. I no longer speak as smoothly as I used to. I don’t debate as well as I used to.”
“But I know what I do know: I know how to tell the truth. I know what is right and wrong. And I know how to do this job. I know how to get things done. And I know, like millions of Americans, that when you get knocked down, you get back up,” he said to loud cheers.
Biden’s team has reported that the campaign has raised more than $33 million as of Thursday, $26 million from smaller donations, about half of which came from new donors this cycle. According to the campaign, Thursday was the best grassroots fundraising day, while Friday, the day after the debate, was the second best day.
Michael Tyler, Biden’s campaign communications director, said there had been “no internal conversation” about Biden resigning, though he also acknowledged the president had had a “bad night” on stage.
Clyburn and Graham were guests on CNN’s “State of the Union” and Warnock appeared on NBC’s “Meet the Press”
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Beaumont reported from Des Moines, Iowa. Associated Press writers Matthew Daly, Zeke Miller and Seung Min Kim contributed to this report.