Former Vice President Joe Biden seems to feel his 2020 run may be faltering. His campaign aides still reportedly don't want to tell him that.
Biden's presidential campaign has all the trappings of a winning run: An experienced, beloved politician with a tragically heroic backstory, Edward-Isaac Dovere describes in The Atlantic. But polls and fundraising totals are showing Biden isn't thriving the way he'd hope, and his staffers are reportedly struggling to claim otherwise.
"Biden's campaign lives in a dual reality," in which he's simultaneously winning most polls and yet still "being written off as finished," Dovere writes. Biden aides chalk a lot of that rhetoric up to the media, making "vaguely Trumpian" complaints in which they claim reporters "cover only bad news about Biden and fail to understand what actual heartland voters want," Dovere continues.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Yet behind the scenes, Biden is "aware that there are issues with the campaign, especially as it relates to money," one staffer said. His Iowa organization is smaller than Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and even South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg's, and fundraising shortfalls have turned into cutbacks on TV and online ads. That fact has led some aides to "feel like they're just spinning one another in staff meetings about how well things are going," some tell The Atlantic — and even Biden himself is reportedly "realizing with dread that the race might be slipping away."
When asked about his supposedly falling campaign, Biden unequivocally defended his fundraising and organizing. Read more at The Atlantic.
-
Taking aim at Venezuela’s autocratFeature The Trump administration is ramping up military pressure on Nicolás Maduro. Is he a threat to the U.S.?
-
Comey indictment: Is the justice system broken?Feature U.S. attorney Lindsey Halligan has indicted former FBI Director James Comey on charges of lying and obstructing Congress
-
Government shuts down amid partisan deadlockFeature As Democrats and Republicans clash over health care and spending, the shutdown leaves 750,000 federal workers in limbo
-
Judge bars Trump’s National Guard moves in OregonSpeed Read In an emergency hearing, a federal judge blocked President Donald Trump from sending National Guard troops into Portland
-
Museum head ousted after Trump sword gift denialSpeed Read Todd Arrington, who led the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum, denied the Trump administration a sword from the collection as a gift for King Charles
-
Trump declares ‘armed conflict’ with drug cartelsspeed read This provides a legal justification for recent lethal military strikes on three alleged drug trafficking boats
-
Supreme Court rules for Fed’s Cook in Trump feudSpeed Read Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook can remain in her role following Trump’s attempts to oust her
-
Judge rules Trump illegally targeted Gaza protestersSpeed Read The Trump administration’s push to arrest and deport international students for supporting Palestine is deemed illegal
-
Trump: US cities should be military ‘training grounds’Speed Read In a hastily assembled summit, Trump said he wants the military to fight the ‘enemy within’ the US
-
US government shuts down amid health care standoffSpeed Read Democrats said they won’t vote for a deal that doesn’t renew Affordable Care Act health care subsidies
-
YouTube to pay Trump $22M over Jan. 6 expulsionSpeed Read The president accused the company of censorship following the suspension of accounts post-Capitol riot
