WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden told NBC News in an interview Monday that it was a “mistake” to say he wanted to put a “bull's-eye” on Republican nominee Donald Trump, but argued that the rhetoric from his opponent was more incendiary while warning that Trump remained a threat to democratic institutions.
The remark in question came during a private call with donors last week as Biden had been scrambling to shore up his imperiled candidacy with key party constituencies. During that conversation, Biden declared he was “done” talking about his poor debate performance and said it was “time to put Trump in the bull's-eye,” saying Trump has gotten far too little scrutiny on his stances, rhetoric and lack of campaigning.
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The NBC interview — during which, at times, Biden grew defensive under questions about his fitness for office — came as the president and his reelection team prepared to resume full-throttle campaigning after a brief pause following the weekend assassination attempt on Trump. The Biden campaign let loose a flurry of criticism after the GOP nominee announced freshman Sen. JD Vance of Ohio as his running mate.
“He’s a clone of Trump on the issues,” Biden told reporters as he headed to Nevada for a series of speeches and campaign events. “I don’t see any difference.”
He expanded on that during the NBC interview, telling Lester Holt that Vance has the same policies as Trump when it comes to abortion, taxes and climate change, adding, “He signed onto the Trump agenda, which he should, if he's running with Trump.”
Once Vance was tapped as Trump’s vice-presidential pick, the Biden campaign hit send on a fundraising solicitation signed by the president, and his team issued a blistering statement saying he picked the freshman senator because he would “bend over backwards to enable Trump and his extreme MAGA agenda.” For her part, Vice President Kamala Harris phoned Vance to congratulate him and left him a voicemail message, according to a person familiar with the matter.
And to NBC's Holt, Biden made it clear that he would keep up his focus on Trump. While he acknowledged his “mistake,” Biden nonetheless said he is “not the guy who said I wanted to be a dictator on day one." It's Trump, not Biden, who engages in that kind of rhetoric, Biden said, referring to Trump’s past comments about a “bloodbath” if the Republican loses in November.
“Look, how do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real, when a president says things like he says?" Biden said. "Do you just not say anything because it may incite somebody?”
The NBC interview, scheduled before the attempt on Trump’s life at a rally in Pennsylvania, had been part of Biden’s broader strategy to prove his ability to serve after disastrous June 27 debate performance.
Asked by Holt if he has weathered the worst of it from his own party, Biden responded that 14 million Democratic voters selected him through the primaries and added, “I listen to them.” His mental acuity is “pretty damn good,” Biden added, but he said the question of his age was “legitimate” to ask.
Yet Biden grew visibly testy when asked whether he was eager to “get back on the horse” by participating in another debate against Trump, even before their next scheduled one in September.
“I'm on the horse. Where have you been?” a defensive Biden said. He rattled off his recent travels across the country and a lengthy press conference last week in Washington where he parried questions from nearly a dozen reporters. He said he is “demonstrating to the American people that I have command of all my faculties, that I don't need notes, I don't need teleprompters” — although Biden has used notes and teleprompters in recent appearances, which is not unusual.
As for a potential repeat of his rocky debate, Biden said, “I don’t plan on having another performance on that level.”
The Biden campaign recalibrated some of its political plans in the immediate aftermath of the assassination attempt on Saturday, pulling advertising off the air and hitting pause on messaging. The White House also scrapped Biden’s planned Monday visit to the Lyndon B. Johnson library, where he had been slated to deliver remarks on civil rights.
Biden also spoke privately to Trump after the assassination attempt, a call that the president described in the NBC interview as “very cordial.”
It’s still not finalized when Biden’s campaign ads will resume airing. But Biden is pressing on with the Nevada portion of his previously scheduled western swing, which will include remarks to the NAACP and UnidosUS, a Latino civil rights and advocacy group. He’ll also headline what’s been billed as a “campaign community event” on Wednesday in Las Vegas.
Biden has acknowledged that his candidacy and agenda will be under attack at the Republican National Convention this week, and aides had felt no need to halt their campaign completely, particularly while Biden comes under scrutiny in Milwaukee.
Asked whether the president would adjust his messaging this week in light of the assassination attempt, Biden campaign chairwoman Jen O'Malley Dillon pointed to his Oval Office address as a “roadmap for the whole country,” which she said was no different than Biden's strategy from the start.
Biden’s renewed campaigning this week comes as Democrats have been at an impasse over whether the incumbent president should continue in the race even as he was defiant that he would stay in. Biden has made it clear in no uncertain terms that he remains in the race, and aides have been operating as such.
It was unclear if the attempt on Trump’s life would blunt Democratic efforts to urge Biden to step aside, but it appears to have stalled some of the momentum, for now. No Democrats have called for him to exit the race since the shooting Saturday night.
But in the hours before the assassination attempt, Biden was still facing skepticism from Democratic lawmakers. Rep. Jared Huffman of California said he asked the president during his meeting with the Congressional Progressive Caucus about objectively assessing the trajectory of the race. Huffman said on a social media post that Biden “disagreed with the notion that we are on a losing trajectory.”
But now, several Democrats who requested anonymity were skeptical that there would be enough drive among lawmakers to successfully pressure Biden not to run, especially because they are scattered and away from Washington until next week and because Biden has said he won’t step aside and seized the opportunity to quickly respond to the shooting over the weekend. The people requested anonymity to characterize private conversations.
Many in the Democratic Party had been looking to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to voice concerns directly to Biden. Jeffries met with him at the White House on Thursday night, while Schumer went to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, on Saturday to visit with Biden.
There were still deep concerns that Biden is not up to the job and a sense that pressure to push him out could ramp up again when lawmakers return to Washington. Congressional Democrats were watching the Republican National Convention and Biden’s appearances this week with awareness that the dynamics could change — again.
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AP Congressional Correspondent Lisa Mascaro and AP White House correspondent Zeke Miller contributed to this report.