Biden campaign staffers being encouraged to ‘bypass the narrative’ and ignore reality
Campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon has been internally stoic about the fallout from Biden’s disastrous debate on June 27, aides said.
- As part of her own motivational speech, she told staffers that the 81-year-old president had been personally looking over the stats of what campaign workers are doing in key states and urged them to keep at it.
- “We have to bypass the narrative out there,” she said on the call.
- Principal deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks acknowledged to the staffers that it had been a tough week and urged them to rally.
- Aides noted that the chat function was turned off for the call so they could not respond in real time with concerns.
- A Biden campaign official told Axios that chat functions are “never” enabled on staff calls.
Between the lines: The internal fallout from the debate was made worse by the White House’s senior leadership appearing not to realize how deeply their own aides were impacted by watching Biden’s meandering performance in Atlanta.
- At the Biden campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Del., about two dozen Biden staffers and pro-Biden influencers gathered for a watch party the night of the debate.
- As the president fumbled several answers, one person stood up and then laid down on the floor, despondent, according to a person in the room.
- When the debate’s video feed was temporarily interrupted, one campaign staffer blurted out, “Oh, thank god.”