Biden’s Latest Election Misstep: The Remarkable Parallel To Ted Kennedy’s 1979 Gaffe

One of the most famous presidential candidates' gaffes occurred in 1979, when CBS News reporter Roger Mudd asked aspiring Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Ted Kennedy “The Question:” Why do you want to be president?

Kennedy had no answer, and before the interview was over, Kennedy's chances of defeating incumbent President Jimmy Carter had almost evaporated.

In a bid to outdo Kennedy's verbal blunder, President Joe Biden recently uttered a gaffe for the ages:

President Biden said last week he might not be seeking a second term if former president Donald Trump had not launched his own campaign for the White House.

“If Trump wasn't running, I'm not sure I'd be running,” Biden said at a campaign fundraiser in the Boston area. “But we cannot let him win.”

Rarely has an incumbent president done so much, with so few words, to undermine his campaign. The retort to this remark is obvious: Biden's got a virulent case of Trump Derangement Syndrome (never mind the chronic narcissism).

Naturally, Team Biden was quick to dismiss the remark, but did so in a cringe-inducing fashion:

“President Biden said in 2020 he was running to restore the soul of our nation – he got into the race after Trump said what he did after Charlottesville – and he correctly views the former president as a unique threat to our democracy,” Delaware Sen. Chris Coons, a national co-chair of Biden's 2024 campaign, told CNN. “President Biden beat Trump before, and he will do it again.”

Redemption and soul-saving are well beyond any politician's capabilities. But if you're looking for green energy subsidies, Joe's your guy.

And Biden was given an opportunity to fix his gaffe. But this is how he did it:

Biden himself appeared to walk back the comment when asked later Tuesday whether he'd still be running if Trump wasn't, telling reporters at the White House: “I expect so, but look — he is running, and I have to run.”

That's…nice. But it reinforces the idea that Trump lives in Biden's head rent-free. Worse, it opens the possibility that, if Republicans make a last-minute break with Trump and get behind one of the other GOP presidential candidates, Mr. Biden has already declared he's got nothing. If someone else is the nominee, he's out, retired, and done with politics.

It's a helluva thing for a president to diminish his own prospects like this. Even more so considering it's only December, leaving so much time between now and Election Day for Mr. Biden to make things even worse.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.