Former White House press secretary Jen Psaki says ex-boss President Biden appeared to be “in denial” during his post-debate sitdown with ABC when he talked about his standing with voters.
Psaki, an MSNBC host who once prepped Biden for those sorts of interviews, said his performance during the exchange was “just OK” and did not calm nerves among Democrats in the wake of his disastrous debate a week earlier.
“He also seemed at moments a little bit in denial about the state of the race, and maybe confidence was a strategy going into this,” she said Sunday on “Inside With Jen Psaki.” “But it is also not ideal for people watching and looking for a sign that he recognized the difficulty of the path ahead.
“Overall, when the debate ended, it left us all in this sort of purgatory for the moment. [His interview] was better than the debate, [although] not a home run at all.”
During Biden’s interview with ABC host George Stephanopoulos on Friday, he projected confidence in his prospects of defeating GOP foe Donald Trump and brushed aside questions about how a melange of polling has him losing the race both nationally and in the battleground states.
“All the pollsters I talk to tell me it’s a toss-up. It’s a toss-up,” Biden said — even as pressure mounted for him to withdraw from the race to save the party’s chances at winning the election.
He noted how many political analysts predicted that there would be a red wave in the 2022 midterm elections — but flubbed the year, saying “Remember 2024 — 2020, the red wave was coming.”
Psaki highlighted the portion of the interview where Biden was asked how he’d feel if he stayed in the race and lost to former President Trump.
“I’ll feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the good as job as I know I can do, that’s what this is about,” Biden replied.
A handful of Democrats were deeply dissatisfied with that response and view defeating Trump as paramount for the country.
“I don’t think that’s what he actually thinks, but that sounded to me like something a member of his family told him over the last week or so, and that in itself is a bit concerning,” Psaki said.
She took note of a recent CBS News/YouGov poll in which 72% of registered voters said they don’t believe Biden has the “mental and cognitive health necessary to serve as president.”
“I would say it went just OK for the president,” Psaki remarked of the interview. “In many ways, people watching saw what they wanted to see because, for some, he looks better than he did at the debate.”
Biden’s debate performance deeply rattled Democrats across the country. Already, about half a dozen House Democrats have publicly called on him to step aside.
Top of mind is a fear that voters will reject Biden because of his age and have a lack of confidence that he has the cognitive faculties needed to run the country.
Biden hit the campaign trail after the debate and has started doing more interviews in a bid to rebuild trust.
The president has been adamant that he will stay in the race and on Monday dared wavering Democrats to challenge him for the presidential nod.
Psaki took note of the “panic” among Democrats over Biden and acknowledged that she wasn’t “going to sit here this afternoon and tell you I know the answer” to questions about the best path forward.
She is slated to testify before a congressional inquiry July 26 on the country’s disastrous 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal under Biden.
