The virus AND Bernie Sanders has put Biden is award position as Donald Trump appears everyday on TV, Badly, but still in the public’s eyes….
Biden DOES need to take this time to reach out to supporters who ARE gonna be home more than usual….
In addtion?
He needs to work with Bloomberg and other closed campaigns to lock in staff …
This should NOT be time wasted for organisational work that needs to be ready to roll ten seconds after the all clear is sounded in the future…
Joe Biden reached a new and heady milestone when he shellacked Bernie Sanders in Florida, Illinois and Arizona to become the de facto Democratic nominee for president.
But there was no soaring speech to acknowledge the moment. He never took the stage amid a sea of Biden signs or before an adoring crowd on national television. Biden was instead stuck in a makeshift studio in his Delaware home, webcasting his remarks with a low-quality personal computer camera against a straight-out-of-YouTube black backdrop and two American flags.
He warned about the coronavirus contagion. He offered an olive branch to Bernie Sanders. Then, despite two consecutive weeks of smashing victories, he all but disappeared from the news cycle for days.
The moment was a perfect distillation of Biden’s current predicament — in a state of suspended political animation, trapped between a rival who refuses to quit and the global pandemic that has all but shut down the Democratic primary campaign.
Because Sanders won’t quit, Biden can’t fully pivot to the general election. He can’t truly unite the party’s warring factions. Nor can he begin stockpiling the vast amounts of money he’ll need for November. His momentum has effectively been stopped cold.
A source familiar with the Democratic National Committee’s discussions says the party offered both the Biden and Sanders campaigns the opportunity to open joint-fundraising accounts. But since Sanders declined, the party is reluctant to enter into one with Biden because of the bad optics of seeming to help one candidate.
“That’s going to eventually hurt Biden with financing if the DNC doesn’t go ahead with this,” the source said.
Stuck at home because of coronavirus precautions, Biden also can’t meet with donors at fundraisers — which, in turn, may become less lucrative with an economy that’s sinking into recession or perhaps worse.
“It’s a tough position,” said Matt Littman, who’s hosting a virtual fundraiser for Biden next month that the candidate and donors will attend through tele-conferencing software….
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As new polling suggests that Trump’s approval for responding to the virus is improving, some of Biden’s fellow Democrats worry he’s paralyzed himself.
“Biden is only in limbo if he keeps himself there. He’s only in a predicament to the degree he chooses to view himself in one,” said Jeff Hauser, a veteran of progressive politics who is head of the Revolving Door Project, which watchdogs executive branch appointees.
“Joe Biden can either complain about the fact that he is not getting significant media coverage or he could do something to change that,” Hauser said. “He needs to offer an alternative and offer a running play-by-play critique of the failings of this administration.”