US President Joe Biden has privately complained that he is no longer being given credit for his service, NBC News claimed on Tuesday, citing insiders. Biden is reportedly upset that the national media’s attention has switched to the Democratic presidential nominee, Kamala Harris.
Since Biden ended his campaign in the wake of a disastrous June debate with Republican candidate and former president Donald Trump, Harris has distanced herself from the US president, the report claimed.
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Biden “was particularly stung” by a moment during Harris’s debate with Trump last month, when she said: “Clearly, I am not Joe Biden, and I am certainly not Donald Trump. And what I do offer is a new generation of leadership for our country.”
The remark was in response to Trump equating her with the president on policy. Harris has repeated the same message on other occasions, including a media interview.
“There wasn’t a real interest in hearing about his [Biden’s] accomplishments when he was running. That’s still the case,” a Harris campaign official told NBC News.
Another source said the president “understands completely the general lack of mentioning ‘Bidenomics’ and ‘Joe Biden’” politically. But even though he wants Harris to win and offers whatever support he can to make that happen, he remains bitter about what he takes as being left behind, the report said.
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Prior to his decision to quit the race, the Biden campaign struggled to downplay his moments of frailty and confusion in public, which many voters perceived as signs of decline in the 81-year-old politician. Clips of such moments, used by the Republican party to attack the then-Democratic nominee, were dismissed by officials as “cheap fakes.”
Trump, 78, has had his share of mental slips on the campaign trail, but was universally described as more energetic and coherent than Biden during their June debate.