US President Joe Biden will not drop out of the 2024 election race despite his poor performance during Thursday’s first presidential debate with Donald Trump, campaign spokesperson Seth Schuster has announced.
Following the debate, in which Biden was largely panned, even by fellow Democrats, many in the party suggested that the president should be replaced on the November 5 ballot.
In a text message seen by The Hill, Schuster is apparently attempting to reassure the president’s supporters that he will continue his efforts to be reelected.
“Of course he’s not dropping out,” the campaign spokesperson wrote.
Another member of the president’s team told Politico that Biden will stay in the race because he is “the only person who has ever beaten Donald Trump. He will do it again.”
Biden himself has also dismissed the notion that he should bow out of the race, explaining to reporters at a Waffle House following Thursday’s event that “it’s hard to debate a liar.”
Meanwhile, according to Politico, the Democratic Party is reportedly “panicked” by Biden’s “faltering” display against Trump and is actively discussing the possibility of replacing him with another candidate.
“No one expected this nosedive,” one senior Democratic adviser told the outlet. Biden “was bad on message, bad on substance, bad on counter-punching, bad on presentation, bad on non-verbals. There was no bright spot in this debate for him.”
Concerns over Biden’s performance have also been expressed by a number of major Democratic donors, with one telling Politico that the president had delivered “the worst performance in history” during the debate and “needs to drop out.”
Biden’s team, however, has been scrambling to explain the president’s poor display. One person close to his election campaign claimed that the 81-year-old was “over-prepared and relying on minutiae when all that mattered was vigor and energy.”
“They prepared him for the wrong debate. He was over-prepared when what he needed was rest. It’s confounding,” the person said.
US media outlets have also suggested that Biden’s shaky performance was due to a cold, which they claim has been confirmed by a doctor who examined the president ahead of the debate.