Joe Biden is the most anticipated and feared rival of Donald Trump.



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Already, Trump noticed with an unpleasant surprise that the Democratic field occupied more and more air time and printed thumbs, a space he had enjoyed for him for two years. He tried to counter the rising tide, returning to his practice of conducting telephone interviews with friendly television hosts and intensifying his angry comments on Twitter.

The official response from the President did not take long.

"I only hope that you have the intelligence, long in doubt, to lead a successful primary campaign," wrote Trump. "It will be nasty – you will be dealing with people who really have very sick and insane ideas, but if you succeed, I'll see you at the door!"

Interviewed outside a Wilmington, Delaware, pizzeria, the freshly declared candidate did not show up for the fray.

"Everyone knows Donald Trump," Biden said before boarding the front seat of a black sedan.

All about authenticity

As the Democratic primaries enter a new phase, Trump is increasingly interested in the race as the contestants begin regular appearances on the cable channels and on the airwaves of the campaign.

Trump and Biden – they had to face each other – would compete for voters in the Rust Belt and Midwest regions, where Trump won the traditionally democratic enclaves by appealing to a sense of economic and cultural malaise.

At the same time, Biden represents a vestige of the Obama administration, on which Trump focused to compare his own presidency to that of his predecessor.

At political meetings in the White House, Trump often wonders about Biden's strength, especially since his candidacy has become more certain in recent weeks. The home province of Biden, Pennsylvania – Trump's favorite state, which went from blue to red in 2016 – is at the heart of the president's concerns. Biden's first rally to take place in Pittsburgh on Monday

"If he gets to the general election, yes, that's a problem," said a Republican involved in the meeting, expressing himself under the guise of anonymity. "But how can he survive a Democratic primary?"

Of course, this is a central question that will not be answered for months. But Republicans take Biden as seriously as any candidate – and more seriously than most others.

"I'm still thinking of the 20 candidates currently running in. The former vice president speaks directly to the 90,000 voters in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan who nominated Donald Trump as president." said David Urban, one of the leading advisers to the Trump campaign in Ireland. Pennsylvania. "If voters wanted a third Obama term, they would have voted for Hillary (Clinton) rather than for Donald Trump."

Once assured of appearing at the top of news broadcasts and on the front pages of newspapers – and still himself a major news item – Trump became aware that Democrats are starting to consume more oxygen. policy.

This includes his favorite channel, Fox News, where more and more candidates appear in town halls during prime time, sometimes to Trump's irritation. He recently complained about the appearance of Senator Bernie Sanders, claiming that the network had rigged an audience in front of the town hall in favor of Sanders and complaining of network moderators.

According to his interlocutors, these complaints testify to the irritation of not having the airwaves essentially for himself, a status that he exploited during the early years of his presidency by submerging the news cable broadcasts with tweets and impromptu appearances in front of the cameras.

Now, networks (including Fox) are no longer broadcasting all his live appearances, and more attention is being paid to the Democratic realm as he expands to 20 competitors. On Thursday, for more than half an hour, cameras were dragged through the window of Gianni's Pizza in Wilmington, while Biden made his first public appearance as an officially declared candidate. When he finally emerged, he mostly refused the opportunity to answer questions – a stark contrast to Trump, who rarely goes to a camera bank without stopping.

Biden on the mind of Trump

In response, the president prepares his own direct appeals to the conservative base of voters who will likely not be attracted to the Democrats. He will be telephoning Sean Hannity's Fox News program on Thursday, will address the National Rifle Association at its annual conference in Indiana on Friday, and attend a Saturday night campaign rally in Wisconsin.

Biden's entry was long overdue and Trump has been questioning his advisers for months on the chances of the former vice president. People accustomed to the conversations say that Biden has taken Trump's thinking into 2020 more than any other candidate, although the president has made a private assessment of several Democrats as each of them enters the race or enjoys a moment of national attention.

He denied reporters that he considered the former vice president a danger, saying in an interview with CBS News last year that he "dreamed" of stand against Biden. Earlier this month, he insisted that Biden was held by a long and ignominious record, including under the Obama administration, that Trump was increasingly blaming foreign and economic policy gaffes.

"I do not see Joe Biden as a threat – no, I do not see him as a threat – I think he's only a threat to himself," Trump said. "He's been here a long time, his record is not good, he should be on the record of Obama."

And he strove to create a rift between Biden and other Democrats, saying the whirlwind of allegations of inappropriate behavior earlier this month was the work of Biden's left-wing rivals.

"It seems that the only heavy socialist, somehow, heavily supported by the Socialists, they have had, our former vice president," he said at a gathering of republican fund. "I was going to call him, I did not know him well, I was going to say 'Welcome to the world Joe, are you having a good time?'"

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