President Biden is poised to announce his reelection campaign Tuesday despite low approval ratings and a string of polls showing that most Americans and half of Democrats do not think he should run again, signaling an enthusiasm gap for the oldest president in U.S. history.
After months of hinting and teasing, Mr. Biden is expected to announce his 2024 bid in a formal launch video.
The president said he has accomplished plenty, including a bipartisan infrastructure package, major climate legislation and efforts to rally Western aid to Ukraine. He is openly relishing a rematch with former President Donald Trump, who maintains a grip on the Republican electorate.
Seven in 10 Americans, including half of Democrats, do not want Mr. Biden to run for a second term, a survey has found, and his top domestic policy adviser, Susan Rice, announced her departure on Monday.
Mr. Biden’s approval rating sits at 40% and hasn’t been above the halfway mark since the middle of his first year in office. Gallup showed that it dipped below 50% in early August 2021.
One top pollster said Democrats should be “very concerned” about the lack of excitement about Mr. Biden.
SEE ALSO: Seven in 10 Americans say Biden shouldn’t run again, poll shows
“It is not just money. It is also enthusiasm, which means if Biden’s enthusiasm stays low, he is going to have to work to have people at rallies and working the door-to-door effort in the polls, and it takes a lot of work,” said David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center.
He compared the situation to an aging sports hero who doesn’t want to retire.
“We have a person who got the most votes than any other president in United States history. That is an amazing milestone and probably a tough act to follow, but it is hard to hang up the cleats and walk away,” he said.
Nearly half of those who say Mr. Biden should not run again cite his age as a major reason, according to an NBC News poll released over the weekend.
At 80, Mr. Biden is the oldest sitting American president. If he wins the next election, he will enter a second term at age 82.
The NBC survey showed Mr. Trump, 76, solidifying his position as the front-runner in the Republican primary race, shaping up a potential rematch that few voters want.
SEE ALSO: Susan Rice’s exit leaves hole in Biden team on eve of expected 2024 bid
“The only people who want a Trump/Biden rematch are Trump and Biden, as each believes he can beat the other,” said Darrell West, director of governance studies at the Brookings Institution.
Mr. Trump said Monday he will beat Mr. Biden next year.
“With such a calamitous and failed presidency, it is almost inconceivable that Biden would even think of running for reelection,” Mr. Trump said in a statement. “You know what happened in the last election: they cheated, and they rigged the election. But I promise you this: when I stand on that debate stage and compare our records, it will be Radical Democrats’ worst nightmare because there’s never been a record as bad as they have, and our country has never been through so much. There has never been a greater contrast between two successive administrations in all of American history. Ours being greatness, and theirs being failure.”
Mr. Biden spent the weekend at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland.
He will speak Tuesday at the North America’s Building Trades Unions Legislative Conference in Washington. Labor unions make up a key constituency for the president.
Vice President Kamala Harris will speak about abortion rights at a political event Tuesday with advocates at Howard University, placing the focus on an issue that will animate Democrats in the coming election cycle.
Later in the day, both leaders will burnish their diplomatic bona fides by welcoming South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol to the White House for a summit and a state dinner on Wednesday.
Ms. Rice’s departure on the eve of Mr. Biden’s probable 2024 announcement is notable. She spearheaded some of Mr. Biden’s most controversial and ambitious domestic agenda items, including work on immigration and actions on health care, gun safety and student loans.
Neera Tanden, a liberal senior adviser whose nomination as White House budget director ran into a Senate roadblock, is considered a leading candidate to replace Ms. Rice, according to Axios.
An appointment of Ms. Tanden would suggest a leftward lurch at the White House that could enthuse the liberal base as Mr. Biden enters campaign season.
Mr. Biden is expected to name Julie Chavez Rodriguez, a senior West Wing official and granddaughter of iconic labor leader Cesar Chavez, as his campaign manager.
CBS News, which first reported the development, said the campaign’s headquarters will be in Mr. Biden’s hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, or nearby Philadelphia.
The Republican National Committee wasted little time in outlining its counterattack. It launched a website, FactCheckBiden.com, on Monday.
“Whether it’s claiming that the border is secure, that our economy is strong, or that the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan was a success, Biden and his administration refuse to acknowledge the truth,” RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said. “The RNC will continue to hold Biden accountable for his lies, and in November 2024, the American people will too.”
Polls have found that a wide swath of the electorate has doubts about another run for Mr. Biden, particularly because of his age, though Democrats generally say they like the president and would support his reelection campaign.
A Harvard CAPS/Harris poll taken this month found that 37% of Democrats and three-quarters of independents believe Mr. Biden is too old to be president.
Yet Mr. Biden was easily the top pick in a hypothetical 2024 primary field. He attracted 37% of the vote, versus 10% for Ms. Harris and 8% for Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont. Other notable Democrats drew smaller percentages.
A Monmouth University poll in March found that nearly three-quarters of Democratic voters viewed Mr. Biden favorably, but only a quarter wanted him to run again. Nearly half, or 44%, said they wanted him to step aside so the party could nominate an alternative candidate.
The NBC News survey says 41% of all registered voters report that they definitely or probably will vote for Mr. Biden in the general election and 47% say they plan to vote for the eventual Republican nominee.
Broken down, 88% of Democratic voters, 22% of independents and 3% of Republicans say they will definitely or probably vote for Mr. Biden.
The major question is who Mr. Biden’s Republican challenger would be after a potentially bruising primary race.
Many polls have shown Mr. Biden edging out Mr. Trump in a potential 2024 rematch. In fact, that could be why Mr. Biden is running at all, said Edward Sarpolus, a Michigan-based pollster.
“Would Biden be running if there was a strong alternative and no Donald Trump?” Mr. Sarpolus said. “In politics, you go with the devil you know and not the devil you don’t know.”
He said Mr. Biden might even try to use the storyline about his weak candidacy to his advantage.
“He’d rather have Trump being seen as a tougher candidate so Biden can cast [himself] as an underdog,” he said.
Generally speaking, voters aren’t keen on Mr. Trump, with 35% of poll respondents telling NBC that he should run and 6 in 10 saying he should not.
“There is something wrong with our system when the 2 great national parties, for going on 8 years, have front runners & nominees that are loathed by a majority of Americans,” tweeted Gabriel Sterling, the chief operating officer in the Georgia secretary of state’s office who disputed Mr. Trump’s claims of fraud in the 2020 election results.
Dissatisfaction with the front-runners might be short-lived, given that Mr. Trump’s presence will unify the Democratic base behind Mr. Biden. Meanwhile, Mr. Biden’s candidacy will serve as a foil that rallies the Republican base behind Mr. Trump, Mr. West said.
Mr. Paleologos said both men will have “to figure out how to manage people who may not vote this time because they are not enthused about either candidate.”
The president tends to struggle in hypothetical matchups with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican who may launch a presidential campaign but would have to catch Mr. Trump, who leads by double digits in early primary polling.
Mr. DeSantis, traveling in Japan on Monday, dismissed a question about polls that showed him trailing Mr. Trump in early Republican primary polling.
“I’m not a candidate, so we’ll see if and when that changes,” Mr. DeSantis said.
• Jeff Mordock contributed to this report.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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