Biden, 81, responds to horrific debate performance by bashing Trump and insisting he will win in November: 'I don't debate as well as I used to'

President Joe Biden insisted he can still win the election in his first campaign rally after his disastrous debate performance.

The 81-year-old's car crash showdown with Donald Trump Thursday sparked a crisis within the Democratic Party.

The president used a rally in Raleigh to assuage those fears Friday afternoon.

'I know I'm not a young man. To state the obvious,' Biden said. 'Folks, I don't walk as easily as I used to. I don't speak as smoothly as I used to. I don't debate as well as I used to.'

'But I know what I know - I know how to tell the truth. I know right from wrong. And I know how to do this job. I know how to get things done,' the president argued.

He also assured the crowd 'I give you my word as a Biden.'

'I would not be running again if I didn't believe with all my heart and soul that I could do this job,' Biden said.

‘At Thursday’s debate, the president needed to convince the American public that he was equal to the formidable demands of the office he is seeking to hold for another term,’ wrote the Times editorial board. ‘Voters, however, cannot be expected to ignore what was instead plain to see: Mr. Biden is not the man he was four years ago.’

Biden appeared as ‘the shadow of a great public servant,’ according to the editorial that savaged his performance. ‘He struggled to explain what he would accomplish in a second term. He struggled to respond to Mr. Trump’s provocations. He struggled to hold Mr. Trump accountable for his lies, his failures and his chilling plans. More than once, he struggled to make it to the end of a sentence.’

According to the Times, which has clashed with Biden and hasn't landed a sit-down interview, 'the greatest public service Mr. Biden can now perform is to announce that he will not continue to run for re-election.'

The paper cites the stakes for democracy – but it also has a long-running and personal feud with Biden, who never gave a sit-down interview to the paper.

Trump at his Virginia rally renewed his call to free January 6 rioters, whom he called ‘hostages’ on a day the Supreme Court released an opinion in favor of a rioter who challenged an obstruction charge used against him.

He demanded to ‘free the J6 hostages. They should free them now for what they’ve gone through,’ he said.

‘They’ve been waiting for this decision for a long time,’ he added. January 6 is one of the issues some Biden supporters complained the president wasn’t able to forcefully challenge Trump. The court ruling could also benefit Trump in his case in Washington, D.C. on January 6 charges.

Former President Bill Clinton took to X Friday to defend Joe Biden after his rough debate performance.

'I’ll leave the debate rating to the pundits, but here’s what I know: facts and history matter,' Clinton began.

'Joe Biden has given us 3 years of solid leadership, steadying us after the pandemic, creating a record number of new jobs, making real progress solving the climate crisis, and launching a successful effort in reducing inflation, all while pulling us out of the quagmire Donald Trump left us in.'

'That’s what’s really at stake in November,' Clinton continued.

The former president's post in support of Biden comes hours after Obama similarly posted on social media in support of Joe.

President Biden is speaking in New York City at the grand opening of the new visitor center of the Stonewall National Monument.

He's there to mark the 55th anniversary of the riots where he is joined by superstar Elton John.

The monument pays homage to the ongoing struggles of the LGBTQ+ community.

Biden is having a much stronger Friday after a cringe-worthy debate performance Thursday in Atlanta.

Prosecutors rested their corruption and bribery case against New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez Friday as the Democrat's trial slogs on.

The senator, his wife Nadine and three businessmen were indicted by the Department of Justice for coordinating a bribery scheme last year that involved gold bars, thousands in cash and a luxury car as payments.

Over seven weeks the federal prosecutors laid out their case to the jury, reading out private texts between the lawmaker and Nadine as well as showing images of the bribery payments stored secretly in closets, safes and clothes across the couple's home.

On Monday Menendez's team will lay out their defense, which includes claiming that the senator's Cuban roots have led to his habit of hiding cash and gold.

Menendez's sister could even be called to the stand.

By Charlie Spiering, Senior Political Reporter

Democrats raised the alarm Thursday night and Friday after President Biden's disasterous debate performance, raising questions about who would replace him.

Strategists in Washington, DC spoke to DailyMail.com about why Harris would not neccessarily be their first choice to replace Biden at the top of the ticket.

But other Democrats warned that to try and nominate someone else to replace Biden would be a disaster for the party, as it would anger their base.

Some believe it is still better for Biden to run in his diminished state rather than put Harris at the top of the ticket.

Donald Trump twisted the knife into Joe Biden after his disastrous debate performance by celebrating a 'big victory' and suggesting the U.S. can't survive four more years of his presidency if he can't make it through 90 minutes on stage.

The former president insisted that the 81-year-old is staying in the race despite Democratic Party calls for him to be replaced and a CNN primetime appearance where he 'didn't know what the hell he was doing'.

The 77-year-old took the rally stage in Virginia after the state's Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin, who was once tipped to be a challenger for the GOP presidential nomination.

Trump tore into Biden for his poor performance after a week of rest and then went spoke about migrants, global warming electric cars, Al Capone, Hannibal Lecter, whales, Michelle Obama.

'Did anyone last night watch a thing called the debate? Man, that was a big one,' he told a fired-up crowd in the crucial swing state.

Donald Trump is speaking at a rally in Chesapeake, Virginia fresh off the first presidential debate in Georgia.

'We had a big victory against the man who is looking to destroy our country,' Trump said at the top of his remarks about President Biden. 'He's the worst.'

He took aim at Biden's debate prep at Camp David.

'He studied so hard he didn't know what he was doing,' Trump claimed to laughs. 'He got the debate rules that he wanted. He got the date that he wanted. He got the network that he wanted with the moderates [sic] he wanted.'

'No amount of rest or riggging could help... him defend his record. It's not defensible,' he said taking a long pause mid-sentence.

Former Trump strategist Steve Bannon promised that his MAGA media empire would keep broadcasting even as he prepared to report to prison for a four-month sentence on Monday.

He sent a message to DailyMail.com on Friday, soon after the Supreme Court rejected his attempt to delay his sentence for defying a subpoena in the congressional investigation into the January 6 attack.

I'm a political prisoner. And I won't be the last until we rid ourselves of the Biden regime's lawfare. The rancid nature of this regime was on display for the world to see in all its glory last night.Try as they might they cannot shut down WarRoom. We will be victorious in November.

As some Democrats sound the alarms and call for President Biden to be replaced on the top of the ticket, Democratic voters in Georgia expressed disappointment in the president's debate performance but not surprise.

Amid the bed-wetting by some party officials, voters in the crucial battleground state question who could actually replace Biden at this late stage and are mixed on even attempting to.

But where they do agree is they will vote for Biden if he's on the ticket even after the debate pained them to watch.

By Charlie Spiering, Senior Political Reporter

Vice President Kamala Harris campaigned in Las Vegas on Friday, and only briefly commented on Biden's disasterous debate performance.

‘Last night President Joe Biden and Donald Trump had their first debate. And earlier today the president said himself it was not his best performance,' she said.

Harris spoke for about ten minutes, trying to rally voters after party Democrats erupted with concerns about the upcoming presidential election.

‘We believe in our president Joe Biden and we believe what he stands for,' she said.

The vice president focused on the contrast between Trump and Biden.

‘For all the punditry last night, there is a contrast between someone who lies and someone who leads,' she said.

Harris said that Trump spoke a 'nonstop stream of lies' during the debate.

‘We all know, let’s not forget, he beat Donald Trump once and in Nevada with your help we’re going to do it again,’ she said.

The Supreme Court denied Bannon's appeal to remain out of prison while his appeal of his sentencing is pending.

Former President Barack Obama has finally spoken out about his former VP's bad debate performance.

'Bad debate nights happen,' Obama wrote. 'But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself.'

'Between someone who tells the truth; who knows right from wrong and will give it to the American people straight — and someone who lies through his teeth for his own benefit,' Obama continued, 'Last night didn’t change that, and it’s why so much is at stake in November.'

The former president's condolences come as Democrats are calling for Joe Biden to step aside as the presumptive party nominee.

Amy Walter, editor-in-chief of the The Cook Political Report and a prominent political analyst, said:

I don't think that this debate will sway undecided voters, especially those who say they dislike both candidates. If you came into this debate thinking both men were unsatisfactory choices, their debate performances did not disabuse you of this opinion.

David Plouffe, Barack Obama's former camapign manager, put the mood of Democrats in very stark terms. He said:

It’s kind of a DEFCON 1 moment.

The five-leve DEFCON system is a readiness meaaure for the U.S. military.

DEFCON 1 is the highest level and means nuclear war is imminent.

Plouffe went on:

It really pains me to say this. They (Biden and Trump) are three years apart. They seemed about 30 years apart...and I think that’s going to be the thing that voters really wrestle with coming out of this.

By Morgan Phillips, Congress Reporter

The typically united House Democrats had their biggest break from the president yet in a stinging post-mortem of Joe Biden's debate performance Thursday night.

Nearly all were in agreement that Biden had a 'bad night.'

'He's a great president, he got off to a bad start,' said former Speaker Nancy Pelosi. 'Integrity versus dishonesty on its worst night shines through.'

Julian Castro, former Housing Secretary under Barack Obama, ran against Joe Biden for the Democrat nomination in 2020.

Castro, uniquely among other candidates then, challenged Biden over his memory.

In a debate he asked Biden: 'Did you forget what you said two minutes ago?'

Castro was heavily criticized by other Democrats at the time.

Following the disastrous debate four years later, Castro said:

Biden had a very low bar going into the debate and failed to clear even that bar.

He seemed unprepared, lost, and not strong enough to parry effectively with Trump, who lies constantly.

Nikki Schwab, Chief Campaign Correspondent in Raleigh, North Carolina

First Lady Jill Biden stepped in and defended her husband's debate performance alongside the president Friday in Raleigh.

'What you saw last night on the debate stage was Joe Biden - a president with integrity and character who told the truth. And Donald Trump told lie after lie after lie,' Dr. Biden said.

She marveled when the audience joined in and yelled out that Trump was a liar.

Dr. Biden applauded her husband for spending the last few years helping 'heal the country.'

He 'helped us heal from the chaos of the last administration.'

'We can't choose our chapter of history, but we can choose who leads us through it,' she said. 'There is no one I would rather have sitting in the Oval Office right now than my husband.'

Thomas Friedman, the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist has met in the past with Biden at the White House to discuss global affairs.

After Biden's disastrous debate he wrote:

I watched the Biden-Trump debate alone in a Lisbon hotel room, and it made me weep.

I cannot remember a more heartbreaking moment in American presidential campaign politics in my lifetime, precisely because of what it revealed: Joe Biden, a good man and a good president, has no business running for re-election.

By Katelyn Caralle, Senior U.S. Political Reporter in Chesapeake, Virginia

Supporters are lining up in 80-plus-degree heat waiting for hours to see Donald Trump the morning after he dominated his debate performance against Joe Biden.

The former president is taking a victory lap with a rally in Chesapeake, Virginia with Gov. Glenn Yougkin.

Food stands as well as swag and MAGA souvenir stands line the streets leading to the rally site.

According to Axios, Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina could be a possible Biden alternative.

He's stumping as a Biden surrogate as his first campaign rally after his widely criticized presidential debate Thursday.

Nikki Schwab, Chief Campaign Correspondent in Raleigh, North Carolina

A duo of Democratic-leaning rappers performed ahead of President Joe Biden at his high-stakes rally Friday in Raleigh where he's expected to address last night's debate.

E-40 and Fat Joe took the stage, each performing two songs, including Fat Joe's 'Lean Back.'

They pumped up a crowd where attendees expressed concerns about the president's debate performance.

No Biden supporters DailyMail.com spoke with, however, said they planned to change their vote to former President Donald Trump.

From Rob Crilly, Chief U.S. Political Correspondent

Our pollster, J.L. Partners, asked 805 independent voters after the debate for one or two words to sum up how listening to Joe Biden made them feel.

The results could not be more devastating: Concerned, worried, sad, were the top words.

It didn't sound as if they were describing the leader of the free world, the most powerful man in the world. It sounded as if they were describing their feelings, their fears, about an ageing relative.

Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna issued an eye-opening rebuttal to Joe Biden's debate performance on Thursday night.

Speaking on Capitol Hill, Khanna said the president had a 'great team' who can 'help him', suggesting he will continue to back the string-pullers in the White House.

We have a great team of people that will help govern. That is what I’m going to continue to make the case for

By Morgan Phillips, Congress reporter

Nancy Pelosi defended President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance on Thursday night and brushed off the widespread Democratic panic.

The former House Speaker revealed she hadn’t spoken to the president since his face-off with Donald Trump, but insisted the party doesn’t need a new nominee.

She admitted Biden’s performance ‘wasn’t great,' but ‘outshone Trump’ when it came to ‘values.'

He's a great president, he got off to a bad start. I thought he did okay on the issues later, but again, integrity versus dishonesty on its worst night shines through.

From a performance standpoint it wasn’t great but from a values standpoint he far outshone the other guy.

By Nikki Schwab, Chief Campaign Correspondent in Raleigh, North Carolina

President Joe Biden will headline a rally in Raleigh today as his fate as the Democratic nominee is being questioned after last night's poor debate performance.

It was to be a splitscreen moment - with Biden in North Carolina, a state he wishes to flip from former President Donald Trump's column - and Trump in Virginia, a state the Republican hopes to steal back, despite losing it in 2020 by 10 points.

Trump is expected to have a large rally crowd in Chesapeake, Virginia - a community just outside of Norfolk and Virginia Beach.

Biden's event - which is only utilizing about a sixth of the floor space in a larger venue at the North Carolina fairgrounds - will attract rappers Fat Joe and E-40.

Buckle up...the last day of the Supreme Court's term is officially on Monday.

We will get a ruling then on whether Trump has immunity from federal prosecution for his actions in office.

The Supreme Court ruled that there are limits on charging January 6 rioters with obstruction, in a case that will impact former President Trump's 2020 federal election interference case.

The decision could upend hundreds of cases stemming from the January 6 riot, including Donald Trump's election fraud trial.

The court's ruling makes it harder for January 6 defendants to be charged with obstructing an official proceeding.

That is among the four charges facing former President Donald Trump in Special Counsel Jack Smith's federal case.

Robert Kennedy Jr. was forced to hold a solo event on Thursday night as Donald Trump went head-to-head with Joe Biden, but more than half of independent voters said he should have been allowed to join the top candidates on the debate stage.

RFK Jr. failed to meet the criteria for the debate, falling short of the 15 percent polling threshold and state ballot access required by CNN, which hosted the event.

But a J.L. Partners poll of 805 independent voters who watched the presidential clash found that 55 percent thought he should have been on the stage.

Only 22 percent said he should not have been there.

The results will provide a lift to Kennedy, an environmental lawyer with an anti-vaccine message, who is running as an alternative to the two main candidates.

Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, said he will put forth a House resolution to call on Vice President Kamala Harris to invoke the 25th Amendment after Biden's debate performance.

'I intend to put forth a resolution calling upon the @VP to immediately use her powers under section 4 of the 25th Amendment to convene & mobilize the principal officers of the Cabinet to declare the @POTUS is unable to successfully discharge the duties and powers of his office,' Roy wrote on X.

The 25th Amendment, which outlines presidential succession, gives the vice president and Cabinet power to remove the commander in chief from office via a majority vote in the event it's determined he or she is no longer fit for office.

The Supreme Court included a prominent typo in the name of a critical court case as it wraps up its term – days after the accidental release of a draft opinion on abortion.

This time, the court mistakenly called an opinion City of Grant Pass v. Johnson on its web site. In fact, the city is called Grants Pass. (The opinion itself got the name right).

It comes a day after the court had to issue a correction for a majority opinion authored by Justice Neil Gorsuch that confused an air pollutant with laughing gas in the case of Ohio v. Environmental Protection Agency.

Gorsuch referred repeatedly to ‘nitrous oxide’ – laughing gas – rather than ‘nitrogen oxide,’ the air pollutant in a ruling that blocked an EPA’s ‘Good Neighbor’ plan to reduce smog in downwind states.

The case dealt with federal regulatory boundaries. Chief Justice John Roberts issued the decision on Friday morning.

This opinion claws back expansive federal power - which will have major impacts over all aspects of American lives.

Roberts said on the bench that the decision 'ends our 40-year misadventure with Chevron deference.'

Hillary Clinton weighed in after the presidential debate saying she will still be voting for President Biden.

The former Democratic presidential nominee said the choice in the election is very simple.

'It's a choice between someone who cares about you—your rights, your prospects, your future—versus someone who's only in it for himself,' she wrote on X.

The first Supreme Court decision of the day has just been delivered.

It had to do with whether homeless can be punished for occupying public spaces.

President Biden will not drop out of the 2024 race and is committed to the second presidential debate scheduled for September, according to campaign operatives.

ABC News is set to host the second debate on Tuesday, September 10 at 9 p.m. ET.

The Supreme Court announced it will issue decisions on Friday and Monday. It is rare that the court extended its term into July, they usually try and aim to wrap up by the end of June.

There are several blockbuster cases left this term:

• Trump v. United States: This case will determine if ex-President Donald Trump has immunity from federal prosecution over his alleged efforts to overthrow the 2020 election.
• Fischer v. United States: The court will decide if prosecutors can charge January 6 defendants - and Donald Trump - under an obstruction law. This outcome could impact Trump's federal case - potentially tossing two of his charges.
• City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Gloria Johnson: Whether homeless can be punished for occupying public spaces.
• NetChoice, LLC v. Paxton and Moody v. NetChoice, LLC: This is a First Amendment case dealing with whether states can tell social media giants to remove certain posts.
• Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and Relentless, Inc. v. Department of Commerce: This case deals with federal statute enforcement.

Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman blasted ‘vultures’ in his party after operatives and media figures panicked over Biden’s debate performance with some calling for him to withdraw to avoid a loss

‘I refuse to join the Democratic vultures on Biden’s shoulder after the debate. No one knows more than me that a rough debate is not the sum total of the person and their record,’ wrote Fetterman, who himself won reelection while suffering the after-effects of a stroke.

He referenced ‘morning-after thermonuclear beat downs’ in his own race and took on ‘polling geniuses’ who doubted him. ‘And what happened? The only seat to flip and won by a historic margin (+5). Chill the f*** out.’

Democrats are known for bed-wetting ahead of elections, but the panic mode has shot to another level following President Biden's cringey debate performance in Atlanta.

The president's flubbed answer and pause just minutes into the debate drew an audible gasp from some watching and set off a flurry of frantic text messages of alarm.

Some even took to social media to voice their concerns publicly.

'Obviously that debate was a f***ing disaster. We have to beat Donald Trump. We have to have a nominee who can do that,' wrote former Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau on X.

'It's kind of a DEFCON 1 moment,' Obama 2008 campaign manager David Plouffe said on MSNBC following the debate. He went on that what really matters is how the voters react.

Politico reported some Biden aides found the president's peformance so concerning, they spent the night updating their LinkedIns.

The House's top Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., gave a curt 'no' when asked by reporters whether Biden should step aside from the top of the ticket after his debate performance last night.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., meanwhile, claimed that Democrats on Capitol Hill are 'in full five-alarm fire.'

'They're deeply concerned. They are saying the quiet parts out loud.'

The Biden campaign suffered devastating TV commentary in the minutes after the end of the presidential debate Thurdsay night, and the hits kept coming Friday morning as Americans woke up to digest the news.

‘A lot of people needed a drink after last night,’ said CBS This Morning host Gayle King at the top of her broadcast.

‘He had one job to do last night, Bob. Just one, really,’ she told correspondent Robert Costa in obvious frustration, as he reported there was not an organized Democratic push to get Biden to relinquish the nomination despite his halting performance.

Sarah Ewall-Wice, Senior U.S. Political Reporter

President Biden and Donald Trump hit the campaign trail to rally supporters one day after their face-to-face on the debate stage in Atlanta.

Biden headed to Raleigh, North Carolina late Thursday night for a campaign rally Friday afternoon. He is joined there by First Lady Jill Biden.

The Biden campaign sees North Carolina as a battleground state they could possibly flip blue come November.

Trump is set to deliver remarks on Friday afternoon in Chesapeake, VA near Virginia Beach.

He lost Virginia to Democrats in both 2016 and 2020, but the state elected a Republican governor in 2021. Trump's team sees the state in play in November.

The ex-president will be joined at his event by GOP Governor Glenn Youngkin.

By Geoff Earle, Deputy U.S. Political Editor in Atlanta

Pennsylvania’s telegenic Gov. Josh Shapiro took to the airwaves hours after Joe Biden’s debate flop to tell members of his party to ‘stop worrying’ and rally behind the presumtive nominee.

Shapiro, 51, appeared as a Biden campaign surrogate after key Democratic operatives hit the panic button after the president’s halting performance and influential columnist Tom Friedman called for Biden’s performance ‘heartbreaking’ and said he had ‘no business running for reelection.’

‘I would say to all those folks that are out there worrying right now? Start working and stop worrying,’ he told CNN. He acknowledged Biden had a ‘bad night’ and said the campaign needed a ‘crisper message.’

‘It ain’t easy debating a pathological liar,’ he said. Then he blamed the debate hosts, after Biden stumbled and lost his train of thought in many of his answers, staring downward at times while Trump blasted his record, and according to fact checkers made multiple false statements. ‘I think CNN could have done a better job of calling those lies out,’ he said.

New York Democrat Rep. Ritchie Torres was unimpressed with either candidate's performance last night.

The first presidential debate showdown of 2024 was full of extraordinary moments.

From the start, President Biden's advanced age was on full display after he froze mid-sentence just 12 minutes in. He also repeatedly cleared his throat due to a cold.

That was just the beginning of his blunders and mumblings throughout the debate that has sent Democrats into full-blown panic mode, leading some to say Biden should be replaced on the top of the 2024 ticket.

Democratic and Republican political experts almost all agreed on who clearly ended up on top at the end of the night. DailyMail.com breaks down analysis from top political minds:

An exclusive poll for DailyMail.com found that a clear majority of independent voters believe President Joe Biden should no longer be the Democratic nominee after a car-crash debate with Donald Trump.

Some 62 percent said he should be dumped from the ticket.

Biden looked all of his 81 years on Thursday night as he repeatedly lost his train of thought and meandered into silence.