BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (WIAT) - President Joe Biden held a solo press conference Thursday night after the NATO summit, during which he was asked extensively by reporters about his ability to run the country for another four years.
Local political experts say despite a few blunders, President Biden did much better Thursday than he did in the debate two weeks ago.
“I believe between now and Monday, there will be a lot of soul searching, there will be a lot of that real discussion that political parties should have," Wayne Rogers, chair of the Jefferson County Democratic Party, said.
"They can ride that horse so long but you just can’t ride a person that looks like they belong in a nursing home," CBS 42 Political Analyst Steve Flowers said. "He did good [Thursday] but it didn’t sway anybody.”
Rogers thinks Biden will beat former President Donald Trump in the November election, while Flowers says Biden won’t beat Trump but another democratic candidate like Kamala Harris could.
"Vice President Harris is great, she would be an excellent leader for this country. She was chosen to be vice president because President Biden knew that she would be a great president some day, and he would not have put her in that position had he not known what a great leader she would be,” Rogers said.
"Any democrat can beat Trump. Any republican besides Trump can beat Biden or Harris. Now, Harris is a better candidate than Trump is. She will engage and enthuse the democratic base. That’s why Biden is going to lose, is because young, democratic voters just can’t identify with him,” Flowers said.
Flowers says if Biden is going to be removed from the ticket, it would have to happen within the next week or so as states like Minnesota will begin printing ballots for the election.
"There’s such a difference in the parties now that they talk this one’s extreme or this one’s extreme, and the people really are one side or the other. It’s just a few people in the middle and those people are looking at their country and saying I’m not a democrat or republican, I’m going to vote for the person and this person doesn’t seem mentally capable of being in charge of the nuclear button,” Flowers said.
"There are people who believe Joe Biden should step down from this ticket. Maybe he should. There are some people who are adamant he stay as part of the ticket. It doesn’t matter," Rogers said. "You could run Joe Biden, you could run Kamala Harris, you could run your toaster oven with a walkie switch and I’m voting for him over the other guy.”