In principle, Joe Biden had even more reason to celebrate than his Republican opponent Donald Trump. After all, on ‘Super Tuesday’ he lost one of the fifteen states where voting took place, Vermont, to Nikki Haley. It only involved one state (and a small one at that), but it proves what the exit polls say: that one in four Republicans is not happy with Trump as a candidate.
Biden won all fifteen states for the Democrats, with percentages usually well above 80 percent. His only ‘defeat’ was in American Samoa, an unsightly overseas territory, where only 91 voters showed up for a ‘caucus’ and where a businessman from Baltimore narrowly defeated him.
But there is also a catch with Biden: in many states there was little sign of a protest vote by people who checked ‘undecided’ or ‘no preference’. But in some states, such as Colorado and North Carolina, this was the case, and in Minnesota even about 20 percent voted ‘undecided’. Since one of Biden’s two insignificant challengers, Dean Phillips, comes from that state and also received 8 percent, Biden only scored a good 70 percent there in the cold north.
It looks like Biden has an ongoing problem: Arab Americans and other Palestine sympathizers don’t like him because of his weak attitude towards the Netanyahu government’s actions in Gaza, and young people are jumping on the bandwagon because they simply hate Biden. find old.
Reversing momentum
The president is also 5 percent behind Trump in the polls and must therefore reverse the momentum. Starting Thursday, when he delivers the annual State of the Union address before both houses of Congress in joint session.
According to The New York Times, Biden retreated to his country retreat, Camp David, last weekend with seven advisers and speechwriters to prepare for his State of the Union address. The content of the speech is top secret, although the topics are guessable: the wars in Ukraine and Israel/Gaza, abortion, immigration, the relationship with China.
It is uncertain whether Biden will also mention Trump. Responding to his speech on Tuesday evening, full of blatant lies, is almost impossible. And to attack Trump as a danger to democracy – which will certainly happen often in the coming months – the State of the Union may not be the place. The main intention is to point out to voters that things are not worse than three years ago, as Trump claims, but actually better thanks to Biden’s policies.
Since Biden is mainly criticized because he is too old to become president again (more than 50 percent of Democratic voters think so) and also looks increasingly frail, physically and, according to some, mentally, the way he delivers his speech is also crucial. He is therefore being prepared as if it were a presidential debate, according to a behind-the-scenes look in The New York Times.
‘Let Biden be Biden’
Biden practices the speech intensively to avoid containing words or turns of phrase that would cause him to stutter. The political veteran has been doing this all his life, but only recently has his opponents magnified it to emphasize his alleged mental decline.
Another thing that was intensely practiced, according to The New York Times, is to avoid Biden improvising and letting his emotions speak, which has often led to verbal slip-ups in his career.
The president delivers the speech to the full Congress. In other times this was serene, but that was no longer the case in recent years. There is a real chance that the far-right conspiracy theorist Marjorie Taylor Greene, who called him “liar” last year, or another firebrand without respect for the institutions will shout hostile comments. Biden is being trained to deal with this appropriately. Last year he did that excellently, with an appropriate mix of mildness and sarcasm.
DS Video | Biden and Trump dominate Super Tuesday.
During the preparation weekend, Biden had a copy of a book called Possible: how we survive (and thrive) in an age of conflict. Above all, he wants to deliver his message clearly, for every TV viewer to understand, and in his own way. He seems to have convinced his entourage that this is a good idea, despite the doubts about his age. Various media report that the intention is to send him into the arena more often, in interaction with the people. ‘Let Joe Biden be Joe Biden’ is again the motto at the real start of the campaign. The voter will see the contrast with Trump.
The deficit in the polls and the sharp loss of votes among young black and Latino men, for example, are worrying campaigners, but there is no panic. History shows that polls conducted earlier than a few months before the election are not very predictive. Moreover, Trump’s criminal trials are still hanging over him and Biden has a significantly larger war chest than Trump, who has already lost a fortune in legal fees and fines.
Does Musk support Trump?
After the State of the Union, Biden, first lady Jill and Vice President Kamala Harris will go on the campaign trail in three directions. The president’s first stops will be events in Atlanta and Philadelphia. The organization is now also pulling out all the stops. Especially in battleground states, campaigners will open dozens of offices for the general elections in the coming weeks, while that organization is lagging far behind Trump.
There will also be a real Barnum campaign to remind voters of the blunders, rude statements and dramatic decisions Trump has made, and to claim credit for Biden’s achievements.
Trump can afford that much less at the moment. He spends a lot of time on the phone at Mar-a-Lago, personally begging for support from wealthy sympathizers. The most notable of them is Elon Musk. The richest man in the world is squarely against Biden. Whether this also means that he is willing to use his fortune to help Trump become president again is uncertain. But Musk could single-handedly close the resource gap.
