President Biden hopes to keep the political conversation relevant in the final sprint to Election Day

NEW CASTLE, Del. — As President Joe Biden’s 50-year tenure in elected office nears its end, he doesn’t appear content to quietly retreat from the political stage.

With a week until Election Day, Biden is committed to promoting his administration’s accomplishments and ensuring Americans support Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats on the ballot whether they like it or not.

He is determined to maintain a tight schedule during the final sprint until November 5, even though many in his group seem to be keeping their distance from him.

Biden, speaking to reporters Monday, downplayed the fact that he has not campaigned alongside Harris since their Labor Day campaign appearance together in Pittsburgh, and that he has made several public campaign appearances with Democrats in competitive races. racing.

“I did a lot of surrogate things, and the thing is I also had to continue to be president at the same time,” Biden told reporters after early voting Monday in his home state. Delaware.

Biden said he and Harris still “talk all the time.” He added that he has also made several visits to battleground states in recent months in his official capacity and plans to campaign more in Pennsylvania in the coming days, including his childhood hometown of Scranton.

Officials say Biden also plans to attend a campaign event in Maryland on Tuesday with U.S. Senate candidate Angela Alsobrooks, hold a series of campaign calls on Thursday and return to battleground Pennsylvania on Friday to highlight the democratic support of trade unions.

Biden said Harris’ campaign is asking him to go “where they think I need to be to help them the most.”

After he dropped out, he vowed to actively campaign for the Democrats. But few Democrats have invited him to campaign for them since he ended his re-election bid.

Those dynamics have left the outgoing president having to pick his seats carefully as he tries to maintain a meaningful voice in a chaotic political season.

Trump on social media on Monday ridiculed Harris and Democrats for keeping Biden at bay.

“Not only have the Democrats severely humiliated and embarrassed the con artist Joe Biden, but now they are demanding that he stay away from Kamala’s Lie campaign,” Trump said on Truth Social. “It’s not enough that they took the presidency away from him, just like taking candy from a child, but now they have to embarrass him even more by telling him to ‘GET OUT.’

It should be noted that not all Democrats are avoiding Biden.

Two Democratic Senate candidates, incumbent Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey and Delaware Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, campaigned with Biden this month. Both have deep ties to the president.

Biden stopped at a breakfast spot near his home near Wilmington on Monday with Rochester, a longtime ally who is bidding to become the first Black woman to represent Delaware in the U.S. Senate.

Ahead of the breakfast, he formally endorsed Blunt Rochester in a short video her campaign posted on social media. Biden, in his endorsement, praised Blunt Rochester for being “Delaware through and through.”

The four-term House lawmaker has known Biden for about 30 years and has a strong chance of winning the seat in Democratic-dominated Delaware.

On several occasions over the past few weeks, Biden has used friendly campaign trips to troll Trump.

At a union hall in Pittsburgh on Saturday, Biden gave a mostly standard campaign speech before launching into a blistering attack on Trump supporter Elon Musk. He accused the billionaire tech mogul of working illegally when he first came to the United States to attend college.

“The richest man in the world is now his ally, right?” Biden said, referring to a recent Washington Post report questioning Musk’s status while he was a student at Stanford University. “Well, this richest man in the world ended up here as an illegal worker when he was here” as a student.

Musk, who was born in South Africa, denies the allegations.

Last week, during a stop at the New Hampshire campaign headquarters to meet with Democratic volunteers, Biden borrowed some of Trump’s harsh language.

“We have to lock him up,” Biden told volunteers before quickly correcting his comments to note that he meant Democrats need to “lock him up politically.”

Blunt Rochester joined Biden on Monday as he stood in line for about 40 minutes at a busy early voting site near his home.

Biden thought he had another election ahead of him before deciding to end his campaign in July amid growing concerns among Democrats about his chances of defeating Trump.

He chatted with voters while he waited in line to vote and helped push an elderly woman in a wheelchair who walked ahead of him. He handed his ID to an election official, who had him sign a form and announced, “Joseph Biden is voting now.”

Outside the polling station, Biden told reporters the moment was more “sweet” than bitter. He expressed confidence when asked if he thought Democrats, including Harris, would win.

“I think we will,” he said.

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AP reporter Colleen Long in Washington contributed reporting.