WATERLOO, Iowa — Joe Biden is on a mission to remind Iowa voters why he was the sole front-runner in the Democratic presidential field in the first place and make a comeback after dropping in the polls.
On his “No Malarkey” Iowa bus tour this week, Biden, 77, directly addressed voter anxiety about choosing the best Democratic candidate to take on President Trump in 2020.
“On day one, whoever our next president is, there’s not going to be time for on-the-job training,” the former vice president said in Charles City on Wednesday, referencing his more than four decades of national political experience and relationships with foreign leaders. The next president is “going to inherit a world that’s in disarray,” Biden said, and will need to “repair a nation that’s divided.”
Biden campaign staff for months downplayed expectations about winning the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 3 and the New Hampshire primary on Feb. 11, suggesting victory in the first two early nomination contests was not essential in his path to secure the Democratic presidential nomination. He held far fewer events in Iowa than the other three top-tier candidates.
By the end of September, Sen. Elizabeth Warren had passed Biden in Iowa polls, and two recent Iowa polls show him behind the Massachusetts senator, South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
“I think that’s the reason why Mayor Pete surged ahead, is he was spending a lot of time here talking to everybody. He was a shiny new thing,” a voter told Biden Wednesday during an event at Iowa State University.
No longer running what critics called an “old man schedule,” Biden will have made 25 stops over eight days on his bus tour, ending this weekend. Many were in small, rural towns. Undecided voters at his events told the Washington Examiner that face time with the candidates is important to securing their support.
“I think it really helps to come back to Iowa, to re-meet them,” said Leah Martin, a retired Charles City resident who is deciding between voting for Biden or Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar.
“I wish he’d been here sooner,” said Les Meier, a retired Iowa Falls resident. “That would have been good, you know, just build that base.”
The fourth-place position in Iowa polls has an upside, allowing Biden to set an upward trajectory in the two months before the Feb. 3 Iowa caucuses. And as he refocuses on grassroots events, Biden’s campaign has other encouraging signs.
Stemming worries about Biden’s lackluster $15 million fundraising haul from June through September, his campaign announced Monday that he raised more than $15 million in October and November.
A pair of major endorsements have provided a boost. Former agriculture secretary and two-term Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack endorsed Biden just before Thanksgiving, and former Secretary of State John Kerry endorsed Biden on Thursday. Vilsack joined Biden at events early in the week, and Kerry will campaign with him on Friday.
His competitors are steadily leaving the race. California Sen. Kamala Harris, who delivered one of the sharpest attacks of the campaign when she criticized Biden in a June debate for working with segregationist senators in the 1970s, dropped out of the race on Tuesday. Biden said Wednesday that he would consider making his former rival his running mate. Montana Gov. Steve Bullock, who ran as a moderate alternative to Biden, ended his bid on Monday.
At many campaign events, Biden projected growing enthusiasm for his campaign while referencing crowd sizes. “I was told only about 30, 40 people were going to be here,” Biden said at a stop in Iowa Falls Wednesday with a crowd of about 170. “I was told there were only going to be about 20 people here,” he said Thursday to around 80 people in New Hampton.
Biden put his “No Malarkey” tagline into action on Friday, shutting down a man who expressed concern about Biden’s age and his son Hunter’s work on the board of Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings — a situation that sparked Trump to ask Ukraine to investigate the Bidens, spurring impeachment proceedings in Washington while Biden was campaigning.
“You’re a damn liar, man. That’s not true,” Biden told the man in one of his most heated exchanges on the campaign trail yet. “Let’s do push-ups together, man. Let’s run, let’s do whatever you want to do, let’s take an IQ test.”
The viral moment drew criticism from some but also excited those who hope to hear a similar intensity in a debate against Trump, should Biden be the nominee.
“To the extent he can keep on being out there more and show vigor, I think that would alleviate any fears that may be out there about the fact that he is not a young man anymore,” said Marian Kuper, secretary of the Harden Country Democrats, at a Biden campaign stop in Iowa Falls on Thursday.
