If President Joe Biden was searching for evidence he should drop out, he did not find it during a Trump-style raucus rally in Michigan on Friday night.
At Detroit’s Renaissance High School, the same host of the 2020 Democratic primary rally during which he promised to be a “bridge” to the party’s next generation of leaders, Biden did not stop repeated chants of “Lock him up!” regarding Trump and criticized the press, eliciting “boos” from the raucous crowd.
“I’m just saying, you may have noticed that since the debate, the press and they’re good guys and women up there, they have been hammering me,” he told the event. “Trump has gotten a free pass.”
Biden did try to intercede when the crowd turned on a pro-Gaza protester in a state with one of the country’s most populous Arab and Muslim American communities amid the Israel–Hamas war.
“Folks, look, I understand her passion,” he said. “That’s why I put together a detailed plan that the U.N. has accepted, that the Israelis have accepted, that the Palestinians have accepted. … This war must end.”
Biden also debuted new political attacks on Trump, contending he did not realize you could go bankrupt running a casino.
“Doesn’t the house always win?” he quipped. “Poor Donald, he can’t even watch TV this week because it’s ‘Shark Week.’”
Biden similarly mocked Trump for mistaking former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and onetime House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).
But after Rep. Mike Levin (D-CA) on Friday became the 19th Democrat to implore Biden to step down as the party’s nominee, the president was greeted with energetic chants of “Don’t you quit!” and “We’ve got your back!”
“I know I look 40, but I’m a little bit older,” he said. “Hopefully with age comes a little wisdom. And here’s what I know. I know how to tell the truth. I know right from wrong. I know how and I’ve demonstrated how to do this job. And I know Americans want a president, not a dictator.”
The reception comes after Biden told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos last week that people with whom he was speaking on the campaign trail were encouraging him to remain the Democratic standard-bearer, despite the polls.
During this week’s press conference, his latest political test after the debate, Biden workshopped his response to questions about polls from denying his poor position to asserting that they are premature.
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“If your team came back and showed you data that [Vice President Kamala Harris] would fare better against former President Donald Trump, would you reconsider your decision to stay in the race?” one reporter asked.
“No, unless they came back and said, ‘There’s no way you can win,’” he said. “No one is saying that. No poll says that.”
