The Trump campaign is seizing on recent stumbling and stammering of presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, including his words on China.
A recently released ad shows Biden, 77, slurring his words and displaying confusion, with text on the ad reading, "Biden rejected 'hysterical xenophobia,' until he forgot he did," The Wall Street Journal reported.
The personal attacks are not unlike President Donald Trump's public rebuke of Biden's mental fitness for office both in interviews and recent tweets, while there has been campaign debate over how hard to hit Biden's age and verbal acuity, per the report.
"Joe Biden only recently became the president's presumed opponent, so now it's time to define him," Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh told the Journal. "Over the next six months, voters will learn the horrid truth about Biden's decades-long record. And that includes his cozy relationship with China, and also that Joe has lost his fastball."
The global coronavirus pandemic and widespread media criticism of the White House coronavirus task force's response – along with Biden's words – have forced the campaign to take a more negative personal review vs. substantive policy issues, the Journal reported.
The Biden campaign responded with indifference to the latest ad, per the Journal.
"We don't care," spokesman Andrew Bates told the Journal. "Donald Trump didn't build a great economy. He destroyed one that he inherited from the Obama-Biden administration — by failing to act on coronavirus. His horrific mismanagement of the worst public-health crisis in 100 years has been a train wreck, and it's the American people who are paying the price."
Amid the economic hit by the worldwide shutdowns, the Trump campaign lost its No. 1 selling point and needed an additional message on the weakness of the opposition, according to Republican strategist Alex Conant.
"They need to convince voters that Biden is a riskier choice than Trump," Conant told the Journal. "Given the last two months, that is a high bar. Trump won in 2016 in large part because of Hillary Clinton's deep negative ratings, especially with independents. Trump has no choice but to drive up Biden's negative ratings over the next six months."
But, White House senior counselor Kellyanne Conway contends it is Biden creating the narrative, and it is only political common sense to expose it.
"Challenging Biden's mental acuity and physical energy is fair and best shown through his own gaffes and goofiness," she told the Journal. "Challenging Biden's thin and unimpressive record on everything from jobs and trade to China to healthcare is also fair."
Biden turns 78 in November, is about 3 1/2 years older than Trump and would be the oldest U.S. president to enter office if elected, surpassing Trump's record of 70 in 2016.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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