‘The Two Bidens’: Top White House Aides Tell Axios Biden Only ‘Dependably Engaged’ A Few Hours Per Day
AP Photo/Gerald Herbert
Top White House aides told Axios that President Joe Biden has a window of about six hours during which he is “dependably engaged” and not as “absent-minded.” “slack-jawed,” or prone to “miscues.”
The 81-year-old candidate, who would be 86 before leaving a second term in office, has faced questions about his age, competence, and stamina throughout the campaign.
His performance in Thursday’s CNN presidential debate with Donald Trump sparked a huge wave of concerns within his own party, as MSNBC’s Joy Reid noted just after the debate ended, about whether he will be able to compete and win in November.
The New York Times editorial board, liberal columnist Maureen Dowd, and Democratic strategist James Carville are among some of the loud voices calling for a replacement on the ticket, and the president was met with signs politely asking him to move on as he visited the Hamptons on Saturday.
Even former MSNBC host Chris Matthews agreed a replacement might have a better chance when discussing the debate on Real Time With Bill Maher.
In a weekend report under the headline “Two Joe Bidens: The night America saw the other one”, Axios revealed that top White House aides work “meticulously” to keep the public’s exposure to the octogenarian chief executive limited to a short six-hour window each day, between 10am and 4pm when he is the most alert.
Between the lines: Biden’s miscues and limitations are more familiar inside the White House.
• The time of day is important as to which of the two Bidens will appear.
• From 10am to 4pm, Biden is dependably engaged — and many of his public events in front of cameras are held within those hours.
• Outside of that time range or while traveling abroad, Biden is more likely to have verbal miscues and become fatigued, aides told Axios.
White House spox Andrew Bates pushed back on the idea there are “two Bidens” depending on the time of day, saying in a statement to Axios that there’s just “one Joe Biden, who works his heart out fighting for families like the one he grew up in in Scranton, and who, because of his determination, experience and decency, keeps achieving unprecedented results for them.”
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