DETROIT — President Biden, turning up the volume on his case for another term, delivered his most forceful defense yet of his candidacy in a fiery rally here Friday, charging that Republican Donald Trump was receiving a “free pass” and unspooling a list of factors he said rendered Trump unfit to serve as president again.
Before a crowd of more than 2,000 enthusiastic supporters chanting “Don’t you quit” and “We’ve got your back,” Biden accused journalists and pundits of fixating on his verbal slip-ups while ignoring Trump’s criminal conviction and the accusations of sexual assault and rape against him.
“Mr. Trump raped her,” Biden, emphasizing the word “raped” as he read from a judge’s ruling in a case in which Trump was found guilty of defaming writer E. Jean Carroll after she accused him of assaulting her years ago. “Many people understand the word ‘rape.’”
Biden doubled down on his insistence that he would remain in the presidential race, reiterating that Democratic primary voters had chosen him and complaining that “elites” were trying to undo their will. “You’ve probably noticed there’s been a lot of speculation lately: ‘What’s Joe Biden going to do? Is he going to stay in the race? He’s going to drop out,’ ” Biden said. “Here’s my answer: I am running, and we’re going to win.”
Biden cited an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll that found the presidential race virtually unchanged after the June 27 presidential debate, in which Biden repeatedly made verbal stumbles, prompting a growing number of Democrats to call on him to end his bid for reelection and allow someone else to head the ticket.
“I’m the only Democrat or Republican who has beaten Donald Trump ever. And I’m going to beat him again,” Biden said. “I know him. Donald Trump is a loser.”
Still, the speech came as Biden faced a continuing drip of statements from Democrats urging him to step aside. Two more lawmakers joined the calls for him to end his candidacy Friday, underlining that this week’s high-stakes news conference had not squelched concerns in the party that he would struggle to defeat Trump.
The two defectors — Reps. Brittany Pettersen (D-Colo.) and Mike Levin (D-Calif.) — joined three of their Democratic colleagues who had asked Biden to pull out Thursday night after the news conference concluded. In all, 21 House members had urged the president to reconsider his candidacy as of late Friday — about 10 percent of all House Democrats — as well as one senator, Peter Welch of Vermont.
“Joe Biden saved our country once, and I’m joining the growing number of people in my district and across the country to ask him to do it again,” she said Friday morning. “Please pass the torch to one of our many capable Democratic leaders so we have the best chance to defeat Donald Trump.”
Petterson was followed later in the day by Levin. “Making this statement is not easy,” said Levin. “I have deep respect for President Biden’s five-plus decades of public service … But I believe the time has come for President Biden to pass the torch.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), in a letter to colleagues Friday, said he had met privately with Biden the previous night to discuss the election and convey the sentiments of his fellow Democratic lawmakers. Jeffries did not specify what he had told the president or how Biden had responded, but his letter notably did not urge Biden to stay in the race or say that House Democrats were behind his candidacy.
At Friday’s rally, Biden signaled his intent to lean harder into the argument that whatever his own flaws, Trump is beyond the pale of American politics. He contended that Trump has escaped scrutiny for his numerous liabilities: a criminal conviction, a judicial declaration that he is guilty of sexual assault, the loss of a fraud case and ongoing investigations into his attempt to overthrow the 2020 election.
“They hammer me because I sometimes confuse names. I say that’s Charlie instead of Bill,” Biden said. “But guess what? Donald Trump has gotten a free pass.” He recalled that Trump had mixed up his former Republican opponent, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, with former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“Today we’re going to shine a spotlight on Donald Trump,” Biden said. “The press so far hasn’t. I think they’re going to soon. We’re going to say who he is.”
About 30 minutes into his remarks, Biden laid out a vision for the first 100 days of a second term, a response to criticism that he has been vague about what he would do if reelected. Nearly all of the president’s priorities would require passage by Congress, including making Roe v. Wade federal law, signing the John Lewis Voting Rights Act into law, expanding and strengthening Social Security and Medicare and banning assault weapons.
The president’s impassioned delivery was in a sense its own pitch for Biden’s continued candidacy, an implicit response to Democrats who have worried he no longer has the vigor or forcefulness for a hard-fought campaign.
But the combination of Biden’s determination and his fellow Democrats’ doubts left the landscape where it has been for some time: A Democratic Party deeply divided over the path forward, with the prospect of a second Trump presidency, which most Democrats consider catastrophic, hanging over every move.
The president also continued his behind-the-scenes effort to shore up his support, joining a virtual meeting with BOLD PAC, a group affiliated with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Biden also delivered remarks and took questions during a virtual meeting with leaders from the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus and members of that bloc’s political arm.
On the way to the rally, Biden stopped by a campaign organizing event in a Detroit suburb, joking twice about his age and ending his 14-minute remarks by reassuring organizers that he’s “okay.”
“That’s why I’m running to finish this job. There’s more to do. I know I’m only 41,” Biden said. “I promise you I’m okay.” Earlier in his remarks, as he touted his administration’s accomplishments on health care, the economy and manufacturing, he joked that he was “270 years old.”
Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) said that despite troubling polls for Democrats in Michigan, a state Biden almost certainly must win to retake the White House, the state remains “competitive.”
Some Democrats said they were looking forward to Trump’s imminent announcement of a running mate and to the Republican National Convention taking place next week, hoping that would shift some of the nation’s focus to the GOP’s own vulnerabilities, including Trump’s own misstatements and often rambling speeches.
Biden’s aides hoped the speech would mark another step in Biden’s effort to recover from his stumbling debate performance, following a news conference Thursday when he displayed a sophisticated command of foreign policy and global economics but continued to make verbal missteps.
Early on in the question-and-answer session, for example, he mistakenly referred to Vice President Harris as “Vice President Trump,” a verbal slip that elicited audible gasps in the room and frustration from already-nervous Democrats.
He took issue with a report that he had told a group of supporters he needed to end his days at 8 p.m.
“What I said was, instead of my every day starting at 7 and going to bed at midnight, it would be smarter for me to pace myself a little more,” Biden said. “Instead of starting a fundraiser at 9 o’clock, start it at 8 o’clock — people get to go home by 10 o’clock. That’s what I’m talking about.”
Biden also delivered lengthy, complex answers to a range of foreign policy questions and argued forcefully that he is the most qualified person to defeat Trump and govern the country. Aides seized on those answers, saying they should lay to rest any questions that may have arisen after the debate about the president’s intellectual capacity and mental agility.
The president’s visit to Michigan, however, highlighted another key political vulnerability, one that was bedeviling his campaign well before the June debate: Arab Americans, Muslims and liberals deeply angered by his response to Israel’s war in Gaza. Many have said they will withhold their votes because of his failure to call for a permanent cease-fire and cut off U.S. military aid to Israel.
More than 38,000 Palestinians have died in the enclave in the past nine months, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Israel launched a punishing military assault in Gaza after Hamas militants crossed the border into Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostage.
Michigan is home to the country’s largest Arab American population, with about 300,000 people who claim ancestry from the Middle East or North Africa. Michigan’s Arab and Muslim community overwhelmingly supported Biden in 2020, when he won the state by 154,000 votes.
Abdullah Hammoud, the mayor of Dearborn, Mich. — where Arab Americans make up the majority of the population — said he has not spoken to White House officials for several months about his constituents’ concerns over the war in Gaza. Even as Gaza receded from the headlines in recent weeks, Hammoud said, the situation on the ground has continued to worsen and residents have not lost focus on the issue.
“Earlier this year, the president sent his senior White House officials to listen to the constituency he sought support from four years ago, and there have been no meaningful steps since. Things have only gone backward,” Hammoud said, referring to a Feb. 8 meeting in which senior national security officials visited Dearborn and met with the mayor and other officials.
“We’re looking for a president with the backbone to call for a cease-fire,” Hammoud added. “This is not the president that was promised to us four years ago.”
Most public polls show Biden trailing Trump in Michigan, which is key to the president’s narrowing path to victory — he has few, if any, paths without it.
The Biden campaign argued in a memo obtained by The Washington Post on Thursday that it can win by focusing on the “blue wall” states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.