President Joe Biden’s campaign team has reportedly adopted a new strategy going into the 2024 election. But instead of laying out a framework for combatting inflation or a defense in the face of imminent impeachment hearings, it has only one objective: keep Biden from falling down — literally — on the job.
According to an Axios report that circulated Tuesday morning, the team around President Joe Biden has implemented a number of protocols designed to prevent the president from tripping or falling as he goes about his daily routine.
Worries that Biden — the oldest president ever at the age of 80 — might potentially fall and hurt himself are certainly nothing new: a mishap while playing with his dogs left Biden with a fractured bone in his foot just days after he won the 2020 election, and since then he has stumbled up and down the stairs of Air Force One, fallen off his bicycle, and tripped over a sandbag at the U.S. Air Force Academy.
As Axios noted, Biden’s team moved to circumvent possible disaster early on and paired him with a physical therapist in 2021 in order to work on improving his balance. The president has also taken to wearing tennis shoes more often, reportedly in an effort to keep the slipping and stumbling to a minimum.
The real fear among Democrats, according to the report, is that a “nightmare scenario” — in which Biden suffers a bad fall in the weeks just before the 2024 election — could unfold, and they are pulling out all the stops to make sure it doesn’t happen.
White House Deputy Press Secretary Andrew Bates quickly ran defense for Biden.
“Move over, tan suit! Can confirm: @POTUS is one of the millions of Americans with sneakers,” he posted on X, suggesting that media was only interested in tennis shoes as a potential safety measure when they could use that angle to attack Biden. “Notice that when others do the same, the media’s tone is different? ‘As sneakers take over the workplace, the fashion phenomenon is making its way to Congress.'”
Move over, tan suit!
Can confirm: @POTUS is one of the millions of Americans with sneakers.
Notice that when others do the same, the media's tone is different?
"As sneakers take over the workplace, the fashion phenomenon is making its way to Congress" https://t.co/FnPTQB8q84 https://t.co/WR1YoRYsYE
— Andrew Bates (@AndrewJBates46) September 26, 2023
White House Communications Director Ben LaBolt got in on the defensive play as well, suggesting that the article was a manufactured scandal not unlike the complaints about former President Barack Obama’s now-infamous tan suit.
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“The single greatest scandal in presidential history (since President Obama wore a tan suit).”
I regret to announce that according to @axios I am ancient pic.twitter.com/X9jqUUxUq5
— Andrew Bates (@AndrewJBates46) September 26, 2023
Bates followed that with a photo shared via X that showed his own sneaker-clad feet — and another snap featuring a number of younger Biden staffers also wearing tennis shoes.
“The entire press office is incredibly old. How did we get so old? Matlock is streaming on a loop. What have we done?” he posted.
🚨🚨 The entire press office is incredibly old
How did we get so old
Matlock is streaming on a loop
What have we done https://t.co/WR1YoRYsYE pic.twitter.com/PLh1D8BCYt
— Andrew Bates (@AndrewJBates46) September 26, 2023
Despite the Biden team’s attempts to play off the report, multiple polls have indicated that the American people are worried about Biden’s age and apparent struggles with regard to finding his way off stage and fielding questions from reporters.