Update (2032ET): That was rough. After introducing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as Vladimir Putin - then arriving to his own press conference more than 50 minutes late, a coughing, slurring Joe Biden then called Donald Trump his Vice President as he attempted to show the world what a 'goodest boy' can do.
"I wouldn't have picked Vice President Trump to be vice president, if she's not qualified to be president." pic.twitter.com/UnLFQy05cj
— jordan (@JordanUhl) July 11, 2024
Biden then slurred his way through an answer on whether he thinks he should take another neurological exam.Blinken, Austin and Sullivan the moment Biden said “Vice President Trump”
— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) July 12, 2024
Antony’s reaction to Joe’s flubs always kill me.
pic.twitter.com/ULmvcSfsUG
Biden then blamed his staff for his horrendous debate performance last month, telling the audience that he's "catching hell from my wife."Biden on taking a neurological exam: "The only thing that age does is create a bit of wisdom if you're paying attention ... no matter what I did, no one is gonna be satisfied."
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 12, 2024
But he says he'll take one if docs recommend it. pic.twitter.com/gLEHF9Heyc
Apparently Biden follows the advice of his "commander-in-chief" - whoever that is...Biden: "I love my staff but they add things. They add things all the time at the very end. I'm catching hell from my wife" pic.twitter.com/64D9cVZELj
— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) July 12, 2024
But wait, there's more!Biden’s whisper thing always sounds creepy, not funny. pic.twitter.com/9OSkSziUOr
— emily miller (@emilymiller) July 12, 2024
Fifty seconds apart. pic.twitter.com/Hps1XkhjIQ
— MAZE (@mazemoore) July 12, 2024
Many considered tonight's performance a referendum on what direction the Democratic party will take in terms of support. Looks like they're between a rock and a hard place, as Biden's PredictIt odds dipped and then recovered during the rambling speech - except, 'Vice President Trump' is now gaining ground.
* * *
Cheat-sheet in hand, we are sure; President Biden steps forward tonight for perhaps his final (and most important) press conference ever as he attempts to clam the masses about his 'one off' events at the debate and with Stephanopoulos (and the numerous times before that were all 'cheap fakes', remember).
Since George Clooney admitted he saw the emperor with no clothes on, Biden's odds of getting the nomination have plummeted back to post-debate lows and Kamala is rising from her knees...
So grab your popcorn and get ready for fireworks - there is no way Americans are going to stand for an hour long press conference that is 100% rigged with pre-selected questions that do not test the President in his current state (which makes us wonder, who on his 'team' thought it a good idea to schedule this presser for 630pm!!!)
And now he's lost late-night TV 'comics' too...
Jon Stewart mocking Biden's cognitive decline. pic.twitter.com/zo4w6VJ9RC
— i/o (@eyeslasho) July 11, 2024
Bear in mind that the last time he was forced to do a solo presser, was right after the release of Robert Hur's report wherein Joe was deemed unfit to stand trial due to being an “elderly man with a poor memory."
As @WesternLensman noted on X:
When asked if he was too old for the job, Joe said: “That is not the judgment of the press."
That didn’t age well.
Also in that PC, Joe claimed he was the best person to be president in the US and that his memory was fine — just before confusing the presidents of Egypt and Mexico.
At the time, this was viewed as a fairly hostile press asking some tough questions.
It will pale in comparison to what we’ll see tonight.
The long knives are unsheathed.
The last time Biden was forced to hold a press conference was in the wake of the release of the Hur Report, wherein Joe was deemed unfit to stand trial due to being an “elderly man with a poor memory."
— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) July 11, 2024
When asked if he was too old for the job, Joe said: “That is not the judgment… pic.twitter.com/IZfOWlt6oz
Yes we know it's Thursday evening... yes, we know everyone is trying to dry out a little after July 4th celebrations... but this is too good an opportunity.
Drink every time President Biden says any of the following:
Liar
Clooney
Elites
Jan 6
Golf Handicap
Malarkey
Jill, Hunter, or Beau (double for Beau)
Democracy
Felon
Inflation
And down the whole bottle if Biden 'glitches' for more than 5 seconds flat... because that means it really is all over for 'ol Joe, and Kamala is the gal!
Finally, just minutes before this press conference, Biden introduced Zelensky... as Putin!!
BIDEN: "Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin" 😳 pic.twitter.com/pId2QZ3Ao0
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) July 11, 2024
Watch the press conference live here (due to start at 1830ET)
* * *
Despite President Biden and his team attempting a major, multi-faceted counter-offensive aimed at silencing demands for him to call off his re-election bid, the push to bounce Biden off the ticket has only grown stronger -- with major new developments in the Senate and elsewhere fostering a growing sense that the 81-year-old's campaign is in its final days.
Today could bring the coup de grâce, when Biden hosts a rare, solo press conference at 5:30 pm ET. UPDATE: The press conference has been moved to 6:30 ET. That's well outside the ideal 10am-to-4pm window
in which administration sources say he's best able to function -- and
it will be held on the South Grounds of the White House, with a forecast temperature of 91 degrees. As if that weren't enough to stack the deck against him, the presser will come after Biden has spent a full day in NATO summit meetings, including a session with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
On top of all that, Biden will face a press corps that's been re-programmed to accelerate the ongoing establishment coup that's seen as the last means of beating Trump in November. As we noted in our press-conference preview:
"With Biden on a precipice, Thursday's press conference could be a contest among reporters striving to cement their place in history by being the one to give Biden the decisive shove over the cliff."
Biden's 2024 campaign slid closer to that edge on Wednesday, as Vermont's Peter Welch became the first Democratic senator to publicly call for Biden to exit the race, pointedly saying "We cannot unsee President Biden’s disastrous debate performance. We cannot ignore or dismiss the valid questions raised since that night...I deliver this assessment with sadness."
His call came on the same day that the number of House reps issuing similar pleas to Biden grew to nine, with Oregon's Earl Blumenauer saying Biden "should not be the nominee." Also, New York Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado joined the chorus, in a move that reportedly made Gov. Kathy Hochul "furious."
Of potentially greater Senate significance than Welch's announcement, Democratic Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has reportedly been entertaining avenues by which Biden could be replaced. "Schumer is privately signaling to donors that he's open to a Democratic presidential ticket that isn't led by President Biden," Axios reported. According to three unnamed sources, he has been listening to "donors' ideas and suggestions about the best way forward." Schumer responded to the report by merely reiterating that he "support[s]" Biden."On NBC, a neurologist says Biden has Parkinson’s. “That is a fact. He has degeneration of the brain. Show me the MRI. Show me he doesn't…. He definitely has it." A med student who looked at Biden’s symptoms and didn’t diagnose Parkinson’s, says the doctor, would be failed. pic.twitter.com/VpaBGMCJY7
— Mike (@Doranimated) July 10, 2024
In an attempt to shore up Biden's weakening Senate wall, three of Biden's top political advisors will meet with Democratic senators at lunch today to give an audience to their concerns. Reflecting the increasingly sour mood among upper-chamber Democrats, Punchbowl News reporter Andrew Desiderio says one of those senators spontaneously told him the meeting will be “a waste of everyone’s time if Biden can’t even come make the case himself.”
In addition to the Senate, there's new action on another anti-Biden front, as dozens of Democratic Party delegates are organizing a letter to the DNC seeking nominating-convention rule changes that would make their votes secret and allow delegates to vote their conscience -- rather than being bound to vote for the winners of their state primaries and caucuses.
In a defensive move, members of Biden's campaign team have been calling individual delegates to assess their loyalty to the president, Politico reports. The aides are asking question like, "Do you understand what being a pledged delegate means?" and "Do you have any potential disagreements with the president?"
Wednesday also brought a major-headline broadside from Hollywood, as actor and Biden rainmaker George Clooney published a New York Times op-ed declaring that the Biden he saw at last month's big Los Angeles fundraiser is a shell of his former self:
In George Clooney's NYT op-ed urging Biden to drop out, he says he saw how cognitively crippled Biden rwas at the Hollywood fund-raiser he co-hosted with Obama last month.
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) July 10, 2024
Remember: the media accused anyone saying this *at the time* of being a far-right disinformation agent. pic.twitter.com/j5a87XFcAo
Further fueling the Democrats' sense of all-out crisis, donors large and small are making good on their promises to withhold donations so long as Biden is atop the ticket. Donations to the Biden-Harris campaign have gone into an absolute free-fall, and NBC News served up a variety of doom-and-gloom quotes from various sources "close to" the campaign's fundraising efforts:
- “It’s already disastrous."
- "The money has absolutely shut off."
- “Donors are negative. They had a call with the president. The call seemed so contrived to people...I don’t think they buy it."
There's been a growing comedic edge to Democrats' public remarks this week. On Monday, Biden sent Congressional Democrats a two-page letter
unequivocally declaring that, after having "extensive
conversations...over 10 days" with Democratic party officials,
legislators and voters, he is determined to stay in the race to Nov. 5.
Pretending they didn't read that -- or hear Biden's declaration that it would take a directive from "the Lord Almighty" for him to opt out, prominent Democrats continue talking about Biden's decision in the future tense. Case in point: Nancy Pelosi's Wednesday-morning appearance on MSNBC:
The phenomenon has made for laughs across social media...Does Biden "have your support to be the head of the Democratic ticket? Nancy Pelosi's non-answer: "It's up to the president to decide if he is going to run. We're all encouraging him to make that decision because time is running short." (He has repeatedly said he's running.) pic.twitter.com/nyeZunyY30
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) July 10, 2024
Waiting for Joe to give it to us straight like pic.twitter.com/mvyYuTd4n0
— Liam Donovan (@LPDonovan) July 10, 2024
Biden: I'm staying in the race.
— Kirk A. Bado (@kirk_bado) July 10, 2024
Dems: Biden needs to make a decision.
Biden: I mean it, I'm staying in the race. No joke
Dems: It really is Biden's time for choosing, given the high stakes.
While everyone else is laughing, the pressure from the Biden crisis is clearly getting to Nancy:Biden: I'm running. Only god almighty can change my mind. Challenge me at convention.
— umichvoter 🏳️🌈 (@umichvoter) July 10, 2024
Pelosi: Biden should make his decision soon. Oh he already made it? He should make the decision again
🙂↕️
...while even the long-serving Biden apologists at leftist outlets at CNN are increasingly contemptuous of the Baghdad Bob lines emanating from the White House:I know Nancy Pelosi didn’t look a Black woman in the face and say “Am I speaking English to you?”
— Lavern Spicer 🇺🇸 (@lavern_spicer) July 10, 2024
This is one of the most racist things she’s ever done and there’s a whole list of them!
Girl, you don’t have no business talking to a sista that way! pic.twitter.com/03KHndm2Zw
Journalist: "The point is to suggest that Biden's stamina is better than George Clooney's."
— Joshua Reed Eakle 🗽 (@JoshEakle) July 10, 2024
Tapper: "Ok..." 🙄 pic.twitter.com/O1H5MuaNGI
It can't be long now...
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