Showdown: Teams Trump and Biden in fight of their lives

While serial crises and pandemic pandemonium undermines the White House, Biden’s campaign gathers pace. Susannah Butter has the inside track on the people behind the candidates
Let the battle begin: main, Donald Trump and Joe Biden
AFP via Getty Images

In one corner there’s a campaign characterised by what insiders are calling “intelligent humility”, in the other, there’s a scramble to gain a semblance of control. With 92 days to go until America elects its president, understated Joe Biden is polling ahead of Donald Trump and is winning in Florida, without which no Republican has won an election since Calvin Coolidge in 1924.

But Biden’s camp aren’t taking anything for granted, says Sarah ­Morgenthau, who served in the Obama administration and is one of hundreds of volunteers working unpaid on the Democratic campaign: “There’s a new urgency to getting rid of Donald Trump after the pandemic.”

Last week, Trump floated the idea of postponing the November election, arguing that increased numbers of postal voters due to the pandemic could lead to fraud and an inaccurate result.

Under the Constitution, the President does not have the authority to do so. Still, President Trump has a creative approach to the possible end of his presidency. Asked by Fox News if he would accept the result of the election, the President said: “I have to see. I’m not going to just say ‘yes’. I’m not going to say ‘no’.” If he does reject the result, House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said he would be “fumigated out” of the White House. It’s as high stakes as that.

But team Biden are staying strong. It is expected that he will announce Kamala Harris, a former contender for the Democratic nomination, as his Vice President this week. She is a tough, dedicated star of the Democratic party with a keen legacy of activism.

Trump’s biggest weakness is his hold on reality — Biden is allowing that to play out

“Biden has gone from losing, in February, to winning, more rapidly than any campaign I can remember,” says Jeff Hauser, executive director of The Revolving Door Project, a US not-for-profit. So how is Team Biden doing it — and can they go all the way?

Inner circle tactics

“Trump’s biggest weakness is his hold on reality; Biden is allowing that to play out,” says Hauser. “They haven’t made any huge mistakes yet but that could be because they aren’t taking risks, which could have drawbacks.”

A pivotal question is how far to the Left will Biden go, especially when many of those loyal to Bernie Sanders, who failed to win the Democratic nomination, haven’t decided if they can bring themselves to vote for Biden.

With this in mind, his campaign is consulting more than 100 experts on economic policy, most of them broadly Left-leaning. Ron Klain, who was Biden’s chief of staff when he was vice president, has said he’s never worked in a campaign with so many voices. The challenge is making everyone feel heard and valued while staying on track.

Biden’s inner circle are old friends, and many were also in Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s teams. Mike Donilon, 60, has worked with Biden since 1981 and is behind the message about this being a battle for the “soul of America”. He works with his brother Tom, Steve Ricchetti, who was Biden’s chief of staff, and Ted Kaufman. “Biden is loyal and inspires longstanding connections,” says Hauser.

Joe Biden
Getty Images file

Those on the Left mistrust adviser Anita Dunn, an Obama alumna who is seen as Right-wing, and Lawrence Summers, who is pro-business. But there are younger team members too, including Yohannes Abraham, a former Obama official. “He’s smart,” says Hauser. “He’s given time to thinking about what the progressive wing can learn.”

“The team reflects the diversity of this country,” says Morgenthau. This will be crucial in winning the Latino and African American vote.

“There’s a calmness to what Biden does,” says Morgenthau. “He didn’t expect to be running at this time but understood he was the right person at the right time to restore morality to the country. He’s focusing on how he could change the lives of Americans.”

The same can’t be said for Trump. It’s a bold move to sack your campaign manager four months before an election but last week Brad Parscale was out, replaced by Bill Stepien, previously known for Bridgegate, when he shut roads to punish a mayor for not endorsing the governor he worked for, Chris Christie, for re-election.

Donald Trump
Getty Images

But that was six years ago. Now he is close to Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner. Their strategy for the last 100 days of the campaign is pledging to restore law and order and warning about Biden’s housing regulations, saying he wants to kill the suburbs.

The spin

Biden is playing it straight, focusing on Trump’s response to the pandemic. Trump’s communications directors Tim Murtaugh and Ali Pardo are channelling their energy into undermining Biden, hoping it will have the same effect as their take-down of Clinton.

They’re spending more on advertising than they did the first time round, partly because lockdown makes rallies impossible. The tagline is “We Remember” and it brings up the skeletons in Biden’s past such as his support of the 1994 crime bill, which led to increased incarceration among people of colour.

The question is to what extent Steve Bannon is going to rejoin Trump’s inner circle. “He is sharp and can put concerns in front of swing voters online,” Hauser says.

Another familiar face is Hope Hicks, who returned in February after resigning two years ago, after testifying before Congress during the Russia investigation. She has been working as chief communications officer at Fox but has returned as “counsellor to the President”, focusing on policy. “A lot of the job is keeping Trump in check,” says Hauser.

Hope Hicks departs the West Wing at the White House
REUTERS

The money

The President’s national finance chairwoman is Kimberly Guilfoyle, a former Fox News host whose boyfriend is Trump’s son Donald Jr. There has been tension between her team, many of whom have not worked in fundraising before, and longtime fundraiser Caroline Wren. Three members of the team have left in the past two months.

Despite Trump’s personal wealth, Biden’s campaign has raised $30 million (£23 million) more than the President’s. The average donation is $40, paid online, and have more than $46 million in total. Plenty of celebrity supporters, such as Billie Jean King and Billy Porter, have put on fundraising events.

The family

Both teams have kept it in the family. Biden’s right-hand woman is his younger sister, Valerie Biden Owens. She has a methodical mind and once ran his campaign for class president. “Joe remembers everybody who voted for him. I remember everybody who didn’t. That’s what a sister’s for,” she said.

When she speaks about how her brother understands adversity, she speaks from experience. After Biden’s wife and daughter died in a car accident in 1972, Biden Owens moved in and was a mother figure for his sons Hunter and Beau (who died aged 46 from brain cancer in 2015). She gave up her job as a teacher to run his Senate campaign and his bids to be president in 1988 and 2008.

Trump has Kushner. Where the President is bombastic, his son-in-law has a quiet confidence. He is loyal and good at fighting talk about how Trump “gets things done”. He and wife Ivanka, Trump’s oldest daughter, are still trying to appeal to the liberal New York voters with whom they once mixed. Ivanka has launched an initiative to help Americans find new jobs post-Covid.

For all we know, she and Jared might be first in the queue.

@susannahbutter

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