When I ran for President four years ago, I said, we're in a battle for
the soul of America and we still are.
The question we're facing is whether in the years ahead, we have more freedom or
less freedom, more rights or fewer.
I know what I want the answer to be, and I think you do too.
This is not a time to be complacent.
[MUSIC]
That's why I'm running for re-election.
>> President Joe Biden has officially announced his re-election bid, and
he did so by putting out a three-minute-long announcement video
that urges Americans to get together and finish the job.
The video was meant to be inspiring, but
also took some jabs at Republicans and what they've done to roll back
some of the freedoms that Americans were able to enjoy previously.
So let's go to that, and then we'll discuss.
>> Freedom, personal freedom is fundamental to who we are as Americans.
There's nothing more important, nothing more sacred.
That's been the work of my first term, to fight for our democracy.
This shouldn't be a red revolution.
To protect our rights, to make sure that everyone in this country is treated
equally and that everyone is given a fair shot at making it.
But you know around the country,
MAGA extremists are lining up to take on those bedrock freedoms.
Cutting Social Security that you paid for your entire life while cutting taxes from
the very wealthy, dictating what health care decisions women can make,
banning books, and telling people who they can love.
>> And that was about as harsh as Biden was in his announcement video.
I think that it was right for him to point to all these different
issues that are unpopular among GOP politicians.
Certainly the rollback of reproductive rights helped the Democratic Party
during the 2022 midterms.
But I have to also be honest, I watched that announcement video immediately after
watching Trump's latest attack ad against Ron DeSantis.
And I wish I hadn't done that because it left me wanting more from Biden.
>> Yeah, that's funny because I did it in reverse order.
I'm gonna be much more harsh.
That ad sucked.
It was three minutes, and I nearly dozed off in the middle.
It felt like three hours.
It was just platitude after platitude of I'm for freedom and America is great.
>> There was a lot about individual freedom, which it's so
interesting to hear the Democratic Party take on the jargon,
the rhetoric that we typically would have heard from the Republican Party
back in the day, this emphasis on individual freedom.
>> No, I know why.
Because Biden's whole career has been copying Republicans.
That's all he ever does.
He just copies Republicans and say, well, I'm less vicious, okay?
It's not a red issue, it's not a blue issue.
What's their talking points?
By the end, he's gonna be like, make America spectacular again.
Come on, dude, come on.
Come up with something original.
In that ad he did everything but puppies are cute.
It was so boring.
That 15 seconds you saw of him attacking MAGA extremists, that's it.
That's the only part that was interesting in the ad.
The other two minutes and 45 seconds are nothing, just cotton balls.
And that's Joe Biden.
He's a terrible candidate, terrible.
>> So after he made his announcement,
the Republican National Committee put out their response video.
It's getting a lot of attention because it's allegedly generated 100% by AI,
which is really scary because it doesn't seem like it's generated by AI.
It's actually pretty well done.
And as you can imagine,
I mean, it's coming from the Republican National Committee, it's pretty vicious.
Let's watch.
>> We can now call the 2024 presidential race for Joe Biden.
>> This morning, in China, invades Taiwan.
>> Financial markets are in free fall as 500 regional banks have shuttered
their doors.
Border agents were overrun by a surge of 80,000 illegals yesterday evening.
>> Officials closed the city of San Francisco this morning,
citing the escalating crime and fentanyl crisis.
>> Who's in charge here?
>> It feels like the train is coming off the track.
Now, notice how that response video to Biden's re-election announcement
talks about the future if Biden gets elected and didn't really attack Biden
on the four years, or not the four years, but the amount of time he's been in
office already, what he has done in office already.
I would venture to say that if they had things to attack him on,
then they would have used that.
Instead, they just made things up that could happen in the future if he gets
reelected.
>> No, that ad sucked.
Trump's ads against DeSantis are a thousand times better.
Okay, so the reason why that ad sucked is there's a great number of reasons.
Number one, this is exactly the ads they ran against Biden last time, and
they lost on those ads.
Second of all,
they said all this stuff was already gonna happen in this first term, but it didn't.
So it really falls flat.
So for the extreme MAGA crowd, they're gonna love this, right?
They're going, my God, there's imminent collapse of society.
They love that.
They got their Cantuna ready.
They got all their ammunition ready.
They bought gold.
They're ready, right?
But it hasn't happened.
It's not gonna happen.
They're still looking for the FEMA camps that Obama set up, right?
But outside of that crowd, this is gonna feel stupid and a retread and
things that didn't happen and looks ridiculous.
And in the beginning, they're like, imagine if Biden is re-elected.
Wait, so you agree that he was elected?
>> That's right.
>> And if it's Trump, are we really going to run a whole campaign where Trump
pretends that he won last time?
That's crazy, right?
So, I mean, we all know that the only reason why Biden has any chance of winning
is because Trump might be the nominee on the other side, and
he's literally the only politician in the country less popular than Joe Biden.
Biden's at 38%, Trump's at 34%.
>> Which is why the Democratic Party is elated that things seem to be shaping up
as a rematch between Biden and Trump.
And I wanted to talk a little bit about that because, look,
my concern is when Democrats get a little too cocky.
And it does appear to be the case here, similar to how they were in 2016.
Don't take this situation for granted, don't underestimate your opponent.
And I see a little bit of that happening now, according to reporting from Politico.
So Politico spoke to a number of Democrats, and some, to be fair,
are skeptical at the cockiness.
But I'll start with the Democrats who think this is great,
this is a win for Biden.
Democrats aren't blind to his stubbornly low approval ratings.
But they also know Trump's polarizing profile, including an indictment,
his fixation on the 2020 election, and polarizing profile, both within his own
party and among independents, could be their best matchup in 2024.
So that's the general gist of how the establishment Democratic Party is feeling
about this situation.
Let's go to Debbie Stabenow, who of course is a Democratic senator.
She's retiring, but Stabenow thinks this is the best possible outcome,
meaning a matchup between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
Trump's obviously an extremely dangerous person who would be very dangerous for
the country.
But I'm confident that President Biden would beat him.
Politically, for us, it's helpful if Trump is front and center.
Broadly, she says, the public rejects him.
So, look, I agree that this is ultimately gonna come down to the independent voters,
and Trump does rub people the wrong way- >> But
he is anti-establishment, which independent voters love.
>> Also, Trump has shown that he is planning to go back to what made him so
popular in 2016, which is this hyper-focus on economic populism.
>> Yeah. >> He didn't do much of that in 2020.
>> That's right, and he's talking nonstop about corruption.
Now, it's self serving, and he's claiming that his arrests are corruption.
But American people hate corruption, and no other politicians allowed to talk
about it, because the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, and
most importantly corporate media will rip their face off if they mention the thing
that we all know exists, which is massive corruption in Washington, right?
The reporters will not let you report on that if their life's dependent on it.
There's no way the first person who talks about corruption,
they smear job after smear job after.
But Trump doesn't care, he's been smeared 2000 times.
He's just gonna keep saying the word corrupt and that's gonna resonate.
So, look, you want to talk about playing with fire and being overconfident?
You know what Trump's approval rating was on election day in 2016?
The day that he won?
It was 36%.
>> Wow, I didn't know that.
>> Yeah, I went back and checked because I was writing it in my book, and
I went back and found the sources, 36%.
>> Well, you went back and looked at that.
I actually wanted to go back to find the numbers in regard to the key
battleground states where Biden beat Trump,
because it was really down to three key battleground states.
And it's important to understand that and know that,
because when it comes to the Electoral College, Biden barely won, barely.
Okay, so let me give you the actual details on that.
Let's go to the last graphic here.
The tight races in the trio of states, and the trio includes Arizona, Georgia,
and Wisconsin had a big electoral impact, as NPR's Domenico Montanaro has put it.
Just 44,000 votes in Georgia, Arizona, and
Wisconsin separated Biden and Trump from a tie in the Electoral College.
Okay, so I give you that because those numbers are razor
thin in these key battleground states in 2020.
And Trump had the stink of the coronavirus pandemic on him.
He did not campaign on the economic populism that he tapped into in 2016.
He seems far more aware and willing to tap back into that for 2023.
I'm just saying that I hope Democrats didn't learn all the wrong lessons
from the midterm elections.
I think that they've become a little overconfident after that.
>> 100%, I'll go way further.
So in Politico,
they say, now the Democrats are not blind to Joe Biden's problems, no, they are.
They're definitely blind to it.
When you tell them that people that he pulls at 38%, they're like, no, but
he got a lot accomplished.
First of all, that's not true.
But even if it were true, it doesn't matter.
What matters is, do people like him or don't they like him?
Because we're about to go into a popularity contest called an election.
So Biden won by that razor thin margin because of younger voters.
They showed up 11% more than they did in 2016.
It made all of the difference.
It's the only reason Biden won.
You know what Biden's popularity is among younger voters now?
Now, remember, younger voters, very progressive.
And Joe Biden is apparently the second coming of FDR,
according to Democrats, right?
He's polling at 25%.
Among young voters, he's got to be at like 75%.
Among young voters, he's at 25%.
It's not like that they like Trump, but they really have no interest in Joe Biden.
>> Another thing to keep in mind, though, is, remember, the DNC is intentionally
suppressing primary challengers by refusing to hold any primary debates.
And when you look at how young people on TikTok feel toward Marianne Williamson,
I think the DNC is actually hurting Biden by making it clear that they're trying to
suppress primary challengers like Marianne Williamson,
who seems to be popular with young voters.
>> By the way, so we're equal opportunity truth tellers.
Trump pulled a bitch move today, and he's like, I'm not gonna debate, okay?
>> Which is so stupid.
>> That's so dumb.
Are you kidding me?
Trump, you'd rip DeSantis's face off in a debate.
But okay, good, don't debate, whatever, okay?
I don't want Trump to win, I hate Trump.
So I'm honest about our opinions.
And number one reason I'm worried about Biden is cuz I think he's gonna
lose, right?
But whenever you say it on TV or in the press at all,
the swarm of locusts of DNC consultants attack,
and they're, like, Biden's the only one who could win.
You're playing with fire.
You're playing with all of our lives.
You're playing with democracy.
He won a 36% last time around.
He could easily be a 36% and win this time around.
You guys almost blew it the last time, you definitely blew it the time before.
It's the same clowns.
And now we're gonna have two guys that are above 76 years old.
They're both going to be hiding in their basements, right?
Neither one is gonna debate.
This is the worst election ever.
No one wants either one of the candidates.
Our democracy is in shambles, and they force literally,
the two most unpopular politicians in the country as our only two choices.
It's disgusting.