Outside Advisors Warn Biden Must Focus On Trump, Not Defend Own Record During Debate

Ahead of the upcoming presidential debate on Thursday, top Democrats are sounding the alarm and warning President Joe Biden that he needs to deemphasize his abysmal record as president and instead focus on attacking Trump. Four sources close to the White House told CNN that they've been pushing the Biden campaign to go on offense.

"He wants the credit, but it's not working," an anonymous top Democrat told CNN about Biden's accomplishments. "It needs to stop." Biden has repeatedly attempted to take credit for some of his legislative accomplishments, such as during an interview in Racine, Wisconsin, in May after being asked why voters still prefer Trump's economy. "We've already turned it around … the polling data has been wrong all along," Biden said.

The Biden campaign sources emphasized to the president and his advisors that Biden's message on Thursday should focus less on Biden's economic record and more on Trump's relationship with corporate interests and his tax policies. This would be sound advice given that the American people have soured on Bidenomics, and the president's insistence to claim that the economy is strong and growing has turned off voters.

A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found that voters overwhelmingly trust Trump to reinvigorate the economy over the next four years. From those polled, 41 percent say Trump has a better approach to the economy, while Biden is only trusted by 34 percent of voters. Biden's economy has seen record-breaking credit card default, massive increases in interest rates on mortgages, and various supply shocks that have impacted the price of goods from groceries to construction materials.

Biden's refusal to be realistic about the weaknesses of his record on the economy could end up dooming him, and former Obama advisor David Axelrod said as much earlier this year during an interview with CNN. "I don't understand this. I don't understand all these months later. I thought that he spent $25 million mistakingly last fall touting Bidenomics and making the same argument that the president is making right here. It is absolutely true; the world was plunged into an economic crisis by the pandemic, and we've come back faster than any other country, and he's right about that," Axelrod explained. "But that's not the way people are experiencing the economy. They experience it through the lens of the cost of living. And he's a man who's built his career on empathy."

"Why not lead with the empathy? I think he's making a terrible mistake," the former Obama advisor said. "If he doesn't win this race, it may not be Donald Trump that beats him; it may be his own pride."

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