Biden expounds on policy while his party frets over his delivery

WASHINGTON — For nearly an hour Thursday night, President Joe Biden faced reporters and spooled out ideas shaped by a half-century in elected office.

He spoke about gun violence and taxes, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s economic leverage over Europe.

But at this perilous point in Biden’s candidacy, policy positions aren’t necessarily what his audience needed to hear.

As he struggles to recover from his debate performance last month, Biden is being judged less on the substance of his answers than on the style and clarity of his delivery.

Democratic leaders are considering whether to force him off the ticket. To stanch the rebellion, Biden, 81, needs to prove that he can speak in the crisp, confident tones that voters, or at least the members of his party, expect of a president.

The news conference, capping a three-day NATO summit in Washington, was a major test — the largest since the debate and perhaps the biggest until the Democratic presidential nominating convention next month, if Biden can persevere. There was no teleprompter to guide him through the inquiry, no pre-approved questions that had been slipped to reporters.

By no means was this is a disastrous showing on a par with the debate. But it wasn’t a bravura performance bound to quell doubts about his fitness once and for all.

“It may be too little, too late,” said a Democratic congressman, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Biden misspoke just minutes into his first answer, referring to Vice President Kamala Harris as “Vice President Trump.”

Donald Trump quickly pounced on the gaffe, mocking Biden on his social media site: “Great job, Joe.”

A similar slip-up had come just hours earlier. Introducing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the