Biden's Reelection Political Calculations Complicated by Trump Shooting

Negative Campaign Difficult... Ads Canceled One After Another
Resignation Calls Quiet for Now
"Trump Attack Ad Effect"... Musk and Ackman Support

Former U.S. President Donald Trump’s shooting has complicated President Joe Biden’s political calculations.

On the 14th (local time), CNN reported that President Biden and his campaign are facing a sensitive situation.

On the 14th (local time), President Joe Biden is urging Americans to unite following the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump.
[Image source=AP Yonhap News]

Trump’s shooting has made it inevitable to revise the campaign strategy. After the shooting incident the previous day, the Biden campaign also suspended its campaign against former President Trump. Given the possibility that the suspect’s political views may have motivated the crime, it has become difficult to conduct negative campaigning as before. A senior Democratic adviser told CNN, "The biggest problem is campaigning against or attacking him (former President Trump)," questioning whether that would be possible this week.

The Biden campaign pulled TV ads and halted promotions just hours after the shooting incident. The schedule for the 15th was also canceled. The strategy was changed. Previously, they did not hesitate to call Trump a ‘felon’ and harshly criticized him, but after the shooting, they have stopped attacks and focused on delivering messages of unity. The ads taken down the previous day included one related to the hush money case in which Trump was found guilty of sexual misconduct.

An anonymous Biden campaign official told major foreign media that in the coming days, rather than attacking former President Trump, they plan to criticize the disorder caused by campus protests related to the Israel-Hamas war. They are leveraging President Biden’s history of condemning political violence. This also responds to criticisms from some Republicans that Biden’s criticism of Trump incited the suspect.

One of the biggest issues is when to resume the election campaign. A Biden campaign official told CNN that a more complicated problem is that there are still 114 days until the presidential election, and they need to decide when and how to restart election advertising.

Voices calling for President Biden’s resignation within the Democratic Party are expected to decrease. The focus on the controversy over his age has shifted to the shooting incident in the election atmosphere. President Biden delivered a national address condemning the violence and calling for unity, effectively erasing the TV debate issue. However, it is difficult to say that the controversy over his age has completely died down.

Bloomberg News assessed that this shooting incident provides a brief respite for President Biden, who had been dominating headlines after the TV debate with former President Trump. Another Democratic donor told Bloomberg that they previously believed it was best to replace President Biden, but now that cannot happen without causing chaos.

However, the increase in support for former President Trump due to this incident is a factor that hampers President Biden. Tesla CEO Elon Musk and hedge fund mogul Bill Ackman publicly declared their support for Trump. They had not officially expressed support before. The fact that the shooting occurred in Pennsylvania, a key battleground state in the presidential election, is a significant burden. Matthew Wilson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University, evaluated, "The image of Trump with blood on his face and a raised fist is better advertising than anything money can buy."