The NPR Politics Podcast - What To Expect From Biden's 2024 Reelection Campaign

Episode Date: April 25, 2023

President Biden announced his reelection bid in a video released early Tuesday morning. We break down the issues that he chose to highlight, the political climate heading into 2024, and whether America is ready for a potential Trump-Biden rematch. This episode: political correspondent Susan Davis, White House correspondent Asma Khalid, and national political correspondent Mara Liasson.This episode of the podcast was produced by Elena Moore. It was edited by Lexie Schapitl. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi. Unlock access to this and other bonus content by supporting The NPR Politics Podcast+. Sign up via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Connect:Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.Subscribe to the NPR Politics Newsletter.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hi, this is Krista in Bloomington, Indiana, and I just successfully defended my dissertation for my PhD in music theory. This podcast was recorded at 9.29 a.m. on Tuesday, April 25th. Things may have changed by the time you hear it, but I will still be celebrating my new degree and my new title as doctor. Okay, here's the show. Congratulations. I was going to say, my alma mater, great to hear from you. Wish we could sing you a congratulations. She doesn't want us to sing, trust me. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Susan Davis. I cover politics.

I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House. And I'm Mara Liason, national political correspondent. And folks, he's running. President Biden announced his reelection bid in a video posted early this morning. Let's finish this job. I know we can. Because this is the United States of America. There's nothing, simply nothing we cannot do if we do it together. Asma, we should note he makes this announcement four years to the day that he announced his 2020 bid. And in this video, there is some echoes of the themes that he announced his 2020 bid. And in this video, there is some echoes of the themes

that he ran on in 2020. That's right. I mean, his central pitch, I will say, is that he is running to defend freedom. And he actually has this line in his video announcement where he says, when I ran four years ago, I said we were in a battle for the soul of America, and we still are. And I thought that was a really interesting message because, you know, some would say that are you better off than you were four years ago is kind of the central conceit that candidates run on. Right. That are you better than where you were? And what President Biden is actually saying is you might not be totally better, but let's finish the job. I'll help you get to where you want to be. I have a slightly different take on that. You know, are you better off than you were four years ago is generally what the challenger asks, because the answer is supposed to be no. What really struck me about this announcement was, as Asma rightly pointed out, this emphasis on freedom.

That is usually a Republican talking point. Actually, I think it's in the title of Ron DeSantis' book. But he's turning this on his head and saying the question we are facing is whether in the years ahead we have, quote, more freedom or less freedom, more rights or fewer. But you know, around the country, MAGA extremists are lining up

to take on those bedrock freedoms. Cutting Social Security that you paid for your entire life while cutting taxes for the very wealthy. Dictating what health care decisions women can make. Banning books and telling people who they can love, all while making it more difficult for you to be able to vote.

He's saying that the Republicans are taking away your freedoms. And I think that's a really interesting, pretty aggressive way to go right at the opposition. I thought the same thing, Mara, because for so long, the Republican Party has branded itself as the party of personal freedom. Yeah. And Biden, who knows if it would be successful, but he seems like, at least in this announcement, that he's trying to realign what that debate means and how voters think about it, especially with references to abortion rights and trans rights. Right. Mara, another thing that was striking to me about it is there seems to be a subtle presumption here that he will be running against Donald Trump.

Donald Trump's image is in the video. He specifically name checks MAGA extremists. You know, we've talked a lot about how Trump's the front runner, but it's not a done deal. And it seemed an interesting choice to me to make this announcement also about Donald Trump. Yeah, I think it's an obvious choice. Number one, he's the front runner. Number two, Democrats plan to paint any Republican candidate as a Trump-like candidate. So I think it's a good placeholder for someone else and a good first salvo against Trump if he ends up being the nominee. And don't forget, negative partisanship is the most powerful motivator of voting behavior

today. That means you go into the voting booth and you cast your vote to stop someone, not to elect someone. So I think they have a theory of the case, which is that Joe Biden is not running in a vacuum. As he always says, don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative. But Mara, that is essentially what Biden has to do. Because when you look at his approval ratings, where are they? I mean, he's been below 40% for a very long time. I mean, basically, he's been underwater in terms of public opinion, I believe, since the withdrawal from Afghanistan. President Biden is going to be one of the most unpopular presidents ever to run for reelection. But we're in a whole new world now, where presidential approval ratings seem to be disconnected with how their party does at the polls. Look what happened in 2022.

Big percentages of people who thought Biden did a terrible job on the economy turned around and voted for Democrats. It was interesting to me how little potentially he focused on the economy. I think he did it more in the imagery in the video. I think all these choices are made very precisely in a reelection announcement. There was images of infrastructure projects, of the president walking in factories will say, for the last few months, telecasting his reelection bid has been to visit semiconductor facilities to roll out a bunch of his legislative accomplishments. And that is the sense of what he is going to be running on. We hear from folks that we hear from Democrats all the time that, you know, that they feel like the president's approval rating on the economy is low because voters don't really connect the dots between what he has done and how they feel about the economy. And so they need to essentially get that message out there more overtly. And we've been seeing the president do that, but none of that messaging was really explicitly laid out in this announcement video.

Well, that raises a really big question about how much he will run on a positive message, how much he'll run on his record, which, as the White House says over and over again, for some reason, voters still don't know enough about all the wonderful things he's done. And how much will he run on a negative contrast message? I think the White House theory of the case is clearly the contrast is going to be more important. Any unpopular incumbent running for reelection has to run with a mostly negative message against their opponent. But yes, the White House is doing what it can to call attention to all the things they've done, even though it's really hard for Biden to break through. And for some reason, voters just don't seem to know what he's done or maybe that hasn't really mattered in their personal lives yet. Mara, there has been polling wise an indication that there's been sort of tepid enthusiasm for Biden to run again, even among Democrats. And I think one of the central criticisms of the 2020

race is that he really didn't speak to the hearts and minds of the progressive wing of the party. And I wonder, going into his reelection, do you think that the president has done a good job reaching out to the progressive base? Do you think that the president has done a good job reaching out to the progressive base? Do you think progressive enthusiasm is going to continue to be a problem with him? Like, where is he right now with that part of the party? Well, the former White House chief of staff, Ron Klain, worked extremely hard to keep progressives on board. And yes, some of them are unhappy, but those are precisely the voters who will hold their noses to vote just to stop a MAGA candidate from coming in.

They're really the activists of the party. But I think that meh is trending. Explain. Joe Biden, M-E-H. Joe Biden is the meh candidate. He's just – people are just not enthusiastic about him. As you just said, majority of Democrats say they wish someone else would be the nominee. The question is can he package that into, hey, I'm boring, I'm not super exciting,

but I'm also not super divisive or extreme. Okay, let's take a quick break and we'll talk more about this when we get back. And we're back. And we should note this time around, it's not just Biden when making the announcement. It's Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. She obviously did not have a speaking role in the video, but she was featured several times prominently. Mara, what role do you see the vice president playing in the reelection campaign? How does she help and where are they going to send her? I think that she plays a really important role. She represents the bedrock of the Democratic base, which is African American women. She's going to be on the trail talking about abortion, talking about civil rights.

The question for me about Kamala Harris, which is so interesting, is, you know, hanging over this entire reelection campaign is Biden's age. You know, he's the oldest incumbent ever to run for reelection. He's 80 years old. And the question I have is, would he have You know, he's the oldest incumbent ever to run for re-election. He's 80 years old. And the question I have is, would he have run again if he was confident Harris could win? It's a great question. No Democrat I've talked to is confident that she could win on her own this year. And Biden believes strongly that he's the only person who can beat Donald Trump because he's done it before. And it shows that he's not sure if Harris

is quite ready to be his heir apparent. Mara, you used the word meh, and I think that you could apply that in some ways to Kamala Harris. I think there was a lot of expectations going into office that these four years would be spent helping her become the nominee, and obviously we're not there. But Asma, you know, if Joe Biden were to win, again, Kamala is still in this position where she could be the nominee someday. And so her role in this reelection campaign is still very critical, not just to his fortunes, but her own personal fortunes. Certainly. And I would say that voters will be more attuned to her, one, because she's on the ticket from day one here, but also because of the age

question, right? I mean, Biden being 86 at the end of a second term is unprecedented, right? And I will say voters of all political affiliations bring that up, right? It is an undeniable fact that the country has never seen someone in that position, which just raises questions about who his running mate is. One thing I do want to point out, though, is I think that this administration now, and it's taken a while, has found a distinct role for Harris, and that is around abortion rights. So many voters, and we saw this in the midterms, really highlighted the stripping away of rights, particularly around abortion as being one of their prime motivations for voting for the Democratic Party. I was just speaking with an analyst the other day, a Democratic analyst,

and he told me that that is again what they are seeing, right? Given the Mifepristone case, the medication abortion case that went up to the Supreme Court. There is a sense that voters are very nervous about this, which I think is a role that Kamala Harris speaks to in a way that President Biden has not been able to necessarily speak to, right? And doesn't like to. The president does not like to talk about abortion. This is no accident that tonight on the day of his announcement, she will be on the campus

of Howard University rallying the troops around abortion rights issues. And there's a reason that abortion figured prominently in that video, because the White House theory of the case is that Republicans' political incentives on abortion are misaligned or disaligned. Their activist base wants a national ban. The majority of voters do not. And they think this is a pretty good wedge issue. For a change, it's a wedge issue that works against Republicans instead of Democrats. We should note Republicans did respond.

The RNC put out a response video to the president. But it was striking to me in that it does seem to be setting up what could be a very dark and negative campaign. You know, the president's video opens with images of January 6th and the attack on the Capitol. And the Republican response video, we should note, according to news reports, it was mostly or entirely AI generated. But it also uses I mean, it's profoundly negative. It uses these very dystopian images of the future, of the border, of crises around the world. If Biden were reelected. This morning, an emboldened China invades Taiwan. You know what that sounds like?

That is Donald Trump. That's what a Trumpian Republican Party does, American carnage. But Mara, doesn't that tell you if we are building our way towards a potential Trump-Biden rematch that 2024 is going to be a dark election? Well, the last couple elections were very dark. This one is no different. And especially if Trump is the nominee. He is the candidate of the apocalypse. And he says the only thing standing between you and the utter destruction of your way of life is me. I do think there was a level of optimism, though, when Biden announced his campaign four years ago. He announced that he was running to repair the soul of the nation. And it does feel darker than where the country was four years ago.

I think the messaging from both parties at this point. Look, part of Biden's brand is that he's an optimistic guy. When he says, there's nothing we can't do if we don't do it together, we're the United States of America. He still at least pays lip service. And I think it does come naturally to the belief that the most optimistic candidate wins. And I think even though the Democrats will be just as negative in their attacks on whoever is the Republican nominee, Biden will still push that theme because I think super darkness is a little off-putting to voters. All right, let's leave it there for today. Thank you both. Tomorrow, we're going to be taking a deep dive into a key part of President Biden's first term agenda, boosting U.S. manufacturing.

It's one place where Trump and Biden actually agree. And Asma is going to break it down for us. I'm Susan Davis. I cover politics. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House. And I'm Mara Liason, national political correspondent. And thanks for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.