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Over the course of his long career, President Biden has overcome personal tragedy and political hardship, and he has used his resilience to fuel his ambition. But now that he is embarking on the fight of his political life, his irrepressible quest for a comeback risks looking like a blind defiance against a rising tide.
“You’ve been wrong about everything so far,” Mr. Biden told a group of reporters who asked him Friday why he still thought he was best suited to defeat former President Donald J. Trump, after a dismal performance in an Atlanta debate that plunged his campaign into crisis.
“You got 2020 wrong. You got 2022 wrong. We were going to get wiped out — remember the red wave,” he said, referring to an expected wave of Republican gains that never materialized in the midterm elections. Instead, Democrats did much better than expected, a deciding factor in Mr. Biden’s decision to run for a second term.
He carried that spirit with him during a 22-minute interview on ABC with George Stephanopoulos on Friday, during which he was asked about his 36 percent approval rating.
“I don’t think that’s my approval rating,” Biden said. “That’s not what our polls show.”
To mobilize his supporters, the president is expected to attend several campaign events in Pennsylvania with the first lady on Sunday.
The “comeback kid” myth that Biden has built over his past half-century in politics is clashing with a new reality: He is no longer portrayed as a fighter who overcomes obstacles, but is accused by his critics of putting his own ego before the country. His denial of poll numbers, voter concerns and growing calls from Democrats to abandon him have left some in his party unsure how aggressively to persuade him to change course as time runs out.
For Mr. Biden, the phrase “when you fall down, you get back up” is not just a campaign ad. It is a way of understanding how he sees himself. He sees himself as a combative politician, an everyman who has been consistently overlooked, underestimated and sidelined. For him, detractors are as necessary to his story as his supporters.
He has supporters who say they still believe in him, including Gov. Gavin Newsom, a California Democrat who visited a Biden campaign office in Pittsburgh on Friday to boost morale among volunteers in a crucial state. But even Mr. Newsom, who has been unreserved in his support since Mr. Biden left the debate stage 10 days ago, was clear about the stakes: “This is a really important week and weekend. None of us are naive about the pivot that will follow this debate.”
Campaign officials said before the debate that Mr. Biden’s performance, good or bad, would not cause the polls to plummet.
“This was going to be a close race,” said Kevin Munoz, a campaign spokesman, “and the dynamics at play are ones we’ve long anticipated: Voters continue to be deeply concerned about Donald Trump and his harmful agenda, and the more we engage and speak to voters, the more they support President Biden.”
On Saturday, Mr. Biden participated in a call with a group of senior members of his campaign and spent an hour and 15 minutes gathering their comments on the past few days. Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, a longtime Biden ally, said everyone on the call encouraged him to stay in the race but also expressed concerns about his ability to hold on to office for another four years.
“He asked us to share, ‘Who have you heard, who is critical, who has concerns or who is not convinced?’” Mr. Coons said. Mr. Biden told the group he understood the concerns and wanted to do more interviews and impromptu appearances in the future.
Kate Bedingfield, who served as White House communications director until 2023, said Mr Biden would have to prove himself further in the days ahead.
“I think it’s a very competitive race, but I also think he has a lot of work to do here,” Bedingfield said. “This is a moment where he really has to show people that he’s in this for the reasons that I know he is, which is to protect democracy, to defeat Donald Trump and to push back against the threat that he poses to our country.”
The ABC interview was supposed to allow him to do that. “He didn’t,” David Axelrod, a veteran strategist and former Obama administration official, wrote in an op-ed Saturday. Those close to Mr. Biden felt differently, that he had done enough to continue fighting a system that seems intent on turning against him.
On Saturday, Mr. Biden gathered with his family at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, and attended church with his sister, Valerie Biden Owens. His family has urged him to stay in the fight as much as possible. Last week, the Bidens gathered at Camp David, where their message was the same: Stay in the fight. The family continues to urge Mr. Biden to stay the course, according to people familiar with their thinking.
Jill Biden, the first lady, has been campaigning across the country in recent days. Hunter Biden, Mr. Biden’s son, is pushing for his father to stay in the race.
Mr. Biden may follow the advice of his allies and make calls to Democrats on Capitol Hill to try to prevent the dam from breaking against him, according to a half-dozen people familiar with the Biden family dynamics, but they say his decisions in the coming days and weeks will be heavily influenced by his family.
Democrats have expressed concern in recent days that Mr. Biden’s family could have so much control over his political future. But people who know the family say it has always been that way.
In his memoir, “Promises to Keep,” Biden recounts that when he was considering dropping out of the presidential primary race because of a plagiarism scandal in 1987, his two sons, Beau and Hunter, surprised him in the hallway of his home. They begged him to stay in the race. They worried that he would change if he didn’t run to prove himself and show the world who he was.
“The only thing that matters is your honor,” Hunter, then a teenager, told his father at the time. “That’s what you always taught us. Your honor.”
“You’re going to change, Dad,” warned his son Beau, who died in 2015. “You’ll never be the same.”
Mr. Biden eventually left the race, but the circumstances are different. Beau Biden left, and it was a loss that both eviscerated Mr. Biden and guided his presidency. Hunter Biden was convicted of three counts of firearms, and his ongoing legal troubles are said to weigh heavily on the president.
Moreover, Mr. Biden is now 81. And Democrats closest to him still privately fear what would happen if someone other than him ran on the ticket against Mr. Trump.
Mr Biden insisted his debate appearance was an exception and said he wanted to debate Mr Trump again. He asked Mr Stephanopoulos to watch as US allies descend on Washington next week for a NATO meeting, where he will seek to shore up relations and give a news conference.
“Come listen,” Mr. Biden beckoned to his interlocutor, anticipating the widespread support he has always felt he was owed. “See what they say.”
