the essential
Facing Donald Trump in a first debate in the US presidential election, Joe Biden showed worrying signs of weakness in this exercise. Enough to question the American media about his mental health.
And then Joe Biden lost his words and his train of thought, for many seconds as he returned to the billionaire tax. “We’re going to make sure that all the people who are isolated are eligible for everything that I’ve been able to put in place with COVID. Excuse me, with… Dealing with the… Everything that we’ve had to do with… Listen… If… We finally beat Social Security…”
The President of the United States was then interrupted by the journalist from CNN, the American channel on which this first debate between the President and Donald Trump was broadcast.
GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA – ANDREW HARNIK
“Disastrous debate”
More generally, the American media all debated Joe Biden’s performance this Thursday evening and all came to the same conclusion. “Biden’s disastrous debate launches his re-election into crisis” is the headline of CNN. “Biden delivers unstable performance”, we can read in the Wall Street Journal. Or again “Biden’s shaky debate unsettles Democrats”, analyses ABC.
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On the Democratic side, the goal of this debate was to reassure voters. Because some doubt Biden’s ability to ensure an additional term, while at 81 he is the oldest sitting president of the United States. But this debate has absolutely not lifted the concerns that hang over Joe Biden, on the contrary.
His mental health at the heart of the campaign
These 90 minutes have revived the subject of the age of the outgoing president, who, if he was no longer one, has become one again by force of circumstances. “President Joe Biden is three years and seven months older than former President Donald Trump. In their debate on Thursday night, the gap seemed much greater,” writes CNN, pointing out the many hesitations of the 81-year-old man.
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Hesitations which even pushed Donald Trump to tackle Joe Biden. “I don’t really know what he said at the end of that phase. I don’t think he knows what he said either,” he said during the debate. The former president even asked his opponent to take cognitive tests to ensure his state of health, ensuring that he “is in great shape”.
Joe Biden’s mental health is often called into question and, yesterday, the American media could only see it. “Five moments in the debate where Joe Biden stumbled,” comments the Wall Street Journal, while indicating that “President Biden’s answers on abortion, debt and immigration were sometimes incoherent or rambling.”
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“A painful moment”
The Wall Street Journal continued. “President Biden delivered the kind of delivery Democrats feared, lacking vigor and combativeness.” In contrast, “Trump, meanwhile, was unusually able to keep his cool,” the same newspaper noted, but “the former president told a number of lies around several topics” that all the media outlets relayed. CNN political commentator Van Jones described it as “a painful moment.”
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In the United States, the media assure that Democrats are privately discussing replacing Joe Biden in this presidential election. He, on the other hand, did not wait long to return to the campaign. A few hours later he was in North Carolina. With the heavy task of correcting the situation after a debate which turned, at least in form, to the advantage of his rival Donald Trump.
