(Headline USA) Even MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow admitted this week that President Joe Biden came across as “combative” in his sit-down interview with NBC’s Lester Holt following the attempted assassination on former President Donald Trump.
Reading several sharp retorts Biden made to Holt throughout the interview, Maddow acknowledged during a panel discussion that Biden appeared “punchy” and irritated.
MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell disagreed, claiming “Joe Biden [was] doing Joe Biden” and “responding to questions that were challenges.”
O’Donnell added, “He knows he has to do that.”
Biden has come under fire for continuing his hyperbolic attacks on Trump after Trump narrowly avoided assassination at a Saturday rally in Pennsylvania.
His interview with Holt was another example that Biden has no intention of trying to unify the country, Republicans argued.
“How do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real, when a president says things like he says? Do you just not say anything because it may incite somebody?” Biden asked Holt.
“Look, I’ve not engaged in that rhetoric,” the 81-year-old president falsely claimed. “Now, my opponent has engaged in that rhetoric.”
Biden also denied that his comment earlier this month about the need to “put Trump in the bullseye” contributed to the hyper-polarized environment surrounding the election, but admitted it was a “mistake” to use the word.
“I didn’t say crosshairs. I meant focus on him, focus on what he’s doing, focus on his policies, focus on the number of lies he told in the debate,” Biden claimed.
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NBC’s Lester Holt pushes President Biden on some of the language he has used when talking about Trump in the past.
Specifically, the “bullseye” comment that Biden made on a donor call.
Biden responds, in part, by saying: “you can’t only love your country when you win,”… pic.twitter.com/oSN5Pp6uCn
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) July 15, 2024
At another point, Holt asked about whether Biden thought he’d be able to “get back on the horse” and participate in another debate against Trump following his disastrous performance in the first presidential debate.
“I’m on the horse. Where have you been?” Biden snapped. “I’ve done 22 major events, met thousands of people, overwhelming crowds, a lot’s happening. I’m on the horse.”
Lester Holt just got a sample of Dark Brandon. 🔥pic.twitter.com/Cr9NsQKBtd
— Alex Cole (@acnewsitics) July 16, 2024
He then insisted that he had succeeded in proving to the American people that he was in full control of his cognitive abilities, despite what many considered to be a catastrophic showing last week.
In the course of a few hours he first referred to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “President Putin” and later, during what his press secretaries had billed as a “big boy press conference,” referred to Kamala Harris as “Vice President Trump” while responding to an audience question.
“What I’m doing is going out and demonstrating to the American people that I’m in command of all my faculties, that I don’t need notes, I don’t need teleprompters, I can go out and answer any questions at all,” Biden claimed. “I stood there when NATO was in town, I stood there for an hour and answered questions.”
