Biden dismisses concerns over debate performance and declines to undergo independent cognitive test in interview

One week after a debate performance that was so disastrous it prompted calls for his exit from the presidential race, President Joe Biden attributed his lack of coherence and disturbing appearance to exhaustion and illness.

But Biden called it a limited episode that shouldn’t disqualify him from running for a second term and denied the need for any sort of medical evaluation to determine his continued fitness to run.

Speaking to ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos in his first television interview since the debate debacle, Biden called his poor showing against former president Donald Trump “a bad episode”.

“No indication of any serious condition. I was exhausted. I didn’t listen to my instincts in terms of preparing and — and a bad night,” he said.

But Biden also told Stephanopolous he hadn’t re-watched the 90-minute broadcast.

Asked if he had, he replied: “I don’t think I did, no.”

The 81-year-old president spent most of the broadcast defending his ability to serve out a second term should he win re-election, after which he would leave office at 86 — the most advanced age of any American chief executive.

When pressed directly on whether he was fit to do so, he told the ABC anchor: “Yes, I am.”

But Biden, the oldest man ever to serve as president, also flat-out rejected the idea of him taking any sort of cognitive test when Stephanopolous asked if he was willing to do so, instead repeating an old talking point about the rigors of the presidency serving as a cognitive exam “every day.”

“No one said I had to,” he said.

The 22-minute interview, which aired in its’ entirety in prime time on Friday without any editing, came just hours after he told reporters that he won’t consider standing down from his campaign for a