Top Democrat says Biden debate ‘not the performance we were looking for’

Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) said while President Biden’s debate showing was “not the performance we were looking for,” people should look at the president’s record when comparing him with former President Trump.

“I suspect that, you know, pretty much everybody watched that debate, and thought that the president did not perform the way we would have liked to have seen him perform,” he told Margaret Brennan on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

“However, I’ve spent time around three different presidents, Margaret, and I will tell you that the president’s job is enormously hard and involves all kinds of things, none of which are standing and doing a debate for 90 minutes on TV. The president’s job involves passing legislation. I would hope that people would compare this president’s record in that regard with the last president’s record,” he added.

Biden’s performance has sparked worries among members of his own party following last week’s debate, where he appeared to stumble over some of his answers and misspeak at times. However, Biden and his top surrogates have made efforts to quell those concerns, reiterating that the president will be staying in this race despite calls for him to drop out.

Himes said Biden and Vice President Harris have acknowledged the lackluster debate performance.

“And again, I think he’s acknowledging, the vice president acknowledged that that was not the performance we were looking for,” he said.

“But I’m not so cynical as to believe that the American people are going to choose the president based on a 90-minute debate rather than a four-year record of startling legislative achievements and of setting a tone that the rest of the world says, ‘Wow. America is back to the decent leader that we used to believe that it was prior to the Trump administration,” he added.