The Briefing, Vol. XII, Issue 7
This week:
- Explosive DOJ report questions Biden’s mental competency
- Larry Hogan finds something to do with himself
- Democrat favored in Tuesday special election
President 2024
Biden-documents: Joe Biden might have preferred an indictment to the damning special counsel report that was released on his illegal retention of classified documents. The reasoning behind the decision not to indict Biden was based on the fact that he is basically not mentally fit to be charged. This only raises further questions about his fitness to govern.
The report will be a double-edged sword for the 2024 election. On the one hand, it means that Donald Trump will not be able to simply wave off comments about his own criminal trial or trials (if any of them do ultimately occur this year) or even convictions by pointing at his opponent’s. On the other hand, the report confirms and amplifies Trump’s most damning charge against Biden — the one with the broadest appeal — which is that he is simply not fit for the job.
“[A]t trial,” Special Counsel Robert K. Hur wrote, “Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury,as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic,well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory. Based on our direct interactions with and observations of him, he is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him — by then a former president well into his eighties — of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”
The document also notes: “In his interview with our office, Mr. Biden…did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended (‘if it was 2013 — when did I stop being vice president?’), and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began (‘in 2009, am I still vice president?’).” He also reportedly forgot the date, “within several years,” of when his son Beau, Delaware’s late attorney general, had died.
A sticking point for voters: Of course, Biden’s memory was not necessarily so bad in the late 1970s and the 1980s, the earliest point at which the report mentions him potentially hoarding classified documents, some of which he later used to write memoirs, for example, and some of which he may have shared with a ghostwriter who lacked clearance for them. His memory was not even so bad when he was vice president ten years ago, when a great deal more hoarding occurred. But the special counsel’s underlying point is that a jury might find him sympathetic because of his obvious impairment today.
Even if it lets Biden off the hook, it reinforces the image of Biden as an elderly man who lacks mental acuity and is in no position to continue governing the United States. This may be the most damaging image of Biden in the minds of voters, based on the results of multiple polls going back over the last year.
In the recent NBC News poll we looked at last week, for example, showing Biden’s approval rating at just 37 percent, one of the most striking findings was that only 26 percent of voters agreed with the statement that Biden has the “mental and physical health to be president” as good as or better than Trump’s. That number was down from 46 percent in October 2020, just before Biden awas elected.
A recent CNN survey had a total of 64 percent of Democrats, when asked an open-ended question about their greatest concern with renominating Biden, citing “his age/too old/need someone younger,” “his mental competence/sharpness/senility,” “his health,” “his ability to handle the job/effectiveness,” or “ability to complete a full term/risk of dying.”
Biden made things significantly worse with his Friday press conference, called specifically in order to rebut charges that he is mentally impaired. Many critics charged that Biden’s strange behavior at the event confirmed the same impression.
Biden also released a Super Bowl video about “shrinkflation,” in which he stumbled over many of the words. Never mind that the economic message in the video only raised the question of whether his own administration was to blame for companies charging more for less — more damningly, it made him look old and incapable.
President Donald Trump has worked overtime to promote this idea of Biden as someone lacking mental acuity, frequently promoting memes and making public statements insinuating that Biden is not capable of the arduous slog required of any president. He has just gotten a bit of official support in propagating and amplifying that view. Democrats may live to regret their insistence upon sticking with Biden in 2024.
Senate 2024
Maryland: In poker, the best players are constantly trying to make sure that they have their best bet on the table when they have their best hand. Maryland is not a place where Republicans have much hope for the U.S. Senate — they have not elected a senator since Sen. Charles Mathias’s (R) last win in 1980. But their best possible candidate has, surprisingly, decided to put himself on the table in this race.
Former Gov. Larry Hogan, having dropped the idea of running an anti-Trump campaign for president as a Republican or an independent, is going for Senate. This chip on the table represents a key recruiting victory for Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who for this and other reasons remains relevant in the Republican Party, spite of his feud with former President Donald Trump.
With Sen. Ben Cardin (D) retiring, there will be a fight for this seat, and a massive field has already gathered on the Democratic side. Hogan remains reasonably popular within the Old Line State after having governed as a center-right moderate in most respects. In the right kind of year — if the cards come in exceptionally well — he might just have a chance.
At the very least, Hogan’s presence on the ballot will force Democrats to work a bit for a Senate seat that, under normal circumstances, they would not even bother to worry about.
Montana: Rep. Matt Rosendale (R) jumped into the primary for the Senate seat of Jon Tester (D). Rosendale begins as an underdog against the party favorite, businessman and retired Navy SEAL Tim Sheehy.
Rosendale was supposed to receive the endorsement of House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), but Johnson abandoned plans to make such an endorsement at the behest of Senate GOP leaders.
Wisconsin: National Review reports that businessman Eric Hovde (R) is hiring for a campaign against Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D), and intends to spend heavily out of his own pocket. Baldwin, who has never faced a close race in a state known for them, has appeared vulnerable in some surveys. The latest Marquette University Law poll showed her favorability rating slightly underwater at 42 percent favorablle to 45 percent disapproval.
House 2024
New York-3: Democratic former Rep. Tom Suozzi is narrowly favored in Tuesday’s special election to win back his old district, which until recently had been represented by the expelled former Rep. George Santos (R). This would constrict by one more member the narrow majority with which Speaker Johnson has to work. A win instead by moderate Nassau County Commissioner Mazi Pilip (R) on the issues of Israel and New York City crime would certainly signal trouble ahead for Democrats.
