After facing two weeks of questions about his age and calls to drop his re-election bid, President Biden will try to turn the nation’s attention back to his rival, former President Donald J. Trump, when he campaigns on Friday in Detroit.
Mr. Biden plans to focus his attacks on Project 2025, a blueprint of conservative policy proposals for a future Republican administration created by Mr. Trump’s allies, although Mr. Trump has denied involvement in it. He will also lay out the core policy proposals that he hopes to enact in the first 100 days of a second term, the Biden campaign said in a statement.
The president will be joined by Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist of Michigan, several Democratic members of Congress, union leaders and the actress Octavia Spencer, among other elected officials and activists from the party.
Since his fumbling debate performance last month, Mr. Biden has prioritized rallies with important parts of his base, including African Americans. Detroit has one of the largest Black populations of any city in the nation.
Last weekend, Mr. Biden spoke at a Black church in Philadelphia and addressed union members in Harrisburg, Pa. Next week, he will appear at national conventions for the N.A.A.C.P. and UnidosUS, a major Hispanic advocacy group. Both events are in Las Vegas. He will also conduct “several national interviews, counterprogramming the Republican National Convention,” which begins Monday, his campaign said.
Black elected officials and voters have generally stood by the president since the debate, although his support from African Americans is well below where it stood in 2020.
Michigan is a major battleground state for Mr. Biden, part of the must-win “blue wall” that includes Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. But polls show Mr. Trump leading there. Mr. Biden would have few realistic paths to victory if he cannot hold onto those three states.
Earlier this week, Mr. Biden seemed to have calmed Democratic panic over his candidacy with a blitz that included sending a letter to Democrats in Congress, dialing into MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” and holding a conference call with top donors.
That sense of stability, however, was again disrupted on Wednesday after Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the former speaker, suggested that Mr. Biden could still reconsider his decision to remain in the presidential race. Her statements were followed by more defections from House Democrats, a growing exodus that continued into Thursday, while Peter Welch of Vermont became the first Democrat from the Senate to break with Mr. Biden.
Another key Democratic leader, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, has signaled privately that he is open to replacing Mr. Biden on the ticket.
In Detroit, Mr. Biden is likely to use a teleprompter when giving his speech. Many Democrats have urged him to show he is up for a grueling campaign by being more freewheeling, which he sought to do on Thursday at a high-profile solo news conference in Washington.
Although Mr. Biden delivered deft answers on policy, his attempts at spontaneity did not always go as planned.
On his first answer to the first question, Mr. Biden referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as “Vice President Trump.”
But he ended the news conference with an exhortation to the news media and voters about the former president: “Listen to him.”
#Biden #Seeks #Put #Focus #Trump #Detroit #Campaign #Swing
