There’s a Backup Plan, Right?

Gabriel Debenedetti: “As far as Biden’s camp is concerned, there isn’t any ambiguity about 2024 at all. He has said in private that he sees himself as the only thing standing between the country and the Trumpian abyss and has instructed his aides to redouble their planning for a rematch.”

Said an exasperated longtime Biden adviser: “People ask me with some regularity, ‘When is Biden going to come out and say what he’s going to do?’ And I say, ‘Well, he has!’”

“Relatively few people outside the White House totally buy it. With Trumpism reascendant, ambivalence about Biden’s age and political standing is fueling skepticism just as the image of his understudy, Vice-President Kamala Harris, dips even further than his.”