Biden reaffirms presidential run despite calls to quit
US President Joe Biden has once again insisted he will continue his chequered re-election campaign for the upcoming presidential election in November despite increasing pressure to step down because of his age, Euronews reports.
In a televised interview on Monday, the 81-year-old president said he is confident that “this is my job to get this done”.
“Look, I've been doing this a long time. The idea that I'm the old guy. I am, I am old, but I'm only three years old than [Donald] Trump.
“My mental acuity has been pretty damn good.”
The presumptive Democratic Party nominee said voters should judge him not on the campaign's recent events, but on the three-and-a-half years of his administration so far.
Asked by interviewer Lester Holt whether he felt "a sense of wanting to get back on the horse," Biden replied: “I’m on the horse. Where have you been?”
Biden’s insistence he will continue to campaign comes as a growing number of Democrats and high-profile party donors call for him to stand down from the party's presidential ticket.
The row over his candidacy was kicked off by a disastrous TV debate with Donald Trump, in which the president visibly and audibly struggled to counter his predecessor.
He has lately made a number of gaffes and verbal slip-ups, most recently when he incorrectly referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as Russian President Vladimir Putin at a NATO summit in Washington, DC.
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