Barack Obama remains with his former vice president.
After the president Joe BidenThursday night’s struggling debate performances sent the Democratic Party into a panic. Obama, who was president from 2009 to 2017, joined the discussion with a statement of support.
“There are bad debate nights. Believe me, I know,” he wrote on social media.
“But this election is still a choice between someone who has spent his life fighting for ordinary people and someone who only cares about himself,” Obama continued. “Between someone who tells the truth; who knows right from wrong and will give it to the American people fairly – and one who lies through his teeth for his own benefit.”
“Last night didn’t change that, which is why so much is at stake in November,” he concluded, dropping a link to Biden’s campaign website.
Obama has already helped Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, raise millions of dollars for his re-election, most recently with a flashy, celebrity-studded fundraiser in Los Angeles.
Bad debate nights happen. Believe me, I know. But this election is still a choice between someone who has spent his life fighting for ordinary people and someone who only cares about himself. Between someone who tells the truth; who knows how to distinguish good from evil and tells it to the…
– Barack Obama (@BarackObama) June 28, 2024
Obama himself suffered a memorable defeat in his first debate of the 2012 presidential cycle with former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. On stage in Denver, Obama seemed tired, sluggish and even irritable, prompting The Washington Post to wonder, “Why was President Obama so bad?”
The then incumbent President Obama managed to find his feet in the subsequent debates and won a second term that year with Biden as vice president.
But the concerns surrounding Biden’s current candidacy have to do with the immutable fact of his age.
Former President Donald Trump lied and evaded his way through the debate but still managed to sound clear and concise compared to Biden, whom Trump is only three years his junior.
The debate has some Democratic strategists wondering whether Biden should be replaced as the party’s nominee at the party’s convention in late August.
Biden himself acknowledged the criticism on stage at an event Friday afternoon — where he sounded noticeably more energetic.
“I know I’m not a young man,” Biden told an enthusiastic audience. “I don’t walk as easily as I used to, I don’t 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 right from wrong. I know how to do this job. I know how to get things done. I know, as many Americans know, when you get knocked down, you get back up.”
