Donald Trump is fixated on Joe Biden. But is Biden actually a good candidate?

There are, at last count, 24 people fighting to take Donald Trump’s job at the next election. Trump himself is fixated on one of them.

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There are, at last count, 24 declared candidates for the Democrats’ 2020 presidential nomination. Donald Trump is fixated on one of them.

Last week the New York Times published an extraordinarily frank inside account of Mr Trump’s private behaviour and mindset. It was the sort of article that would have been considered stunning two years ago, but is now simply routine.

Among other things, the story revealed Mr Trump had been calling associates to vent about next year’s election, and specifically, the looming threat of Joe Biden.

This guy. Picture: Getty/AFP

It doesn’t take any cutting political analysis to figure out why. Every poll, without exception, shows Mr Biden would be Mr Trump’s most formidable opponent next year.

Granted, those polls show pretty much every Democrat beating the President, but Mr Biden’s margins are consistently the largest. For example, a Fox News survey released on Sunday had Elizabeth Warren leading Mr Trump 43-41. The same poll showed Mr Biden ahead 49-39. That’s the difference between a close election and a landslide.

We’re not just talking about public polling here either. Mr Trump’s re-election campaign was embarrassed recently when its internal polling numbers leaked, showing the President losing badly to Mr Biden in key states.

Publicly, Mr Trump has repeatedly and indignantly insisted his internal numbers are encouraging — a sure sign they are not.

“We are winning in every single state that we’ve polled. We’re winning in Texas very big. We’re winning in Ohio very big. We’re winning in Florida very big,” Mr Trump told ABC News.

The obvious fib is a clear sign Mr Trump is worried.

He is also baffled. The Times reports he has been telling associates Mr Biden is “too old” and “not as popular as people think”.

Which brings me to the point. For once, Donald Trump is right. Everyone has come to accept that Mr Biden is the runaway favourite to take him on next year, without really asking why.

Give the guy some credit. He, at least, is asking why. Picture: AP

Most of the other Democrats running for president have a clear rationale; a genuine reason to vote for or against them.

Bernie Sanders wants to implement his particular brand of democratic socialism. Elizabeth Warren has a detailed policy platform. Pete Buttigieg, who would be both the youngest ever president and the first openly gay one, is offering generational change.

Joe Biden’s rationale is ... what, exactly? That it happens to be his turn?

Mr Biden really, really likes to remind voters that he was Barack Obama’s vice president. He often speaks of the Obama administration’s record as though it is his own, when everyone knows the American vice president doesn’t actually do all that much.

His pitch essentially boils down to: I was Obama’s vice president. You like Obama, and Obama likes me. Therefore you should vote for me.

The result is tweets like this one, which Mr Biden posted on “Best Friends Day”.

Happy #BestFriendsDay to my friend, @BarackObama. pic.twitter.com/JTd1t7NtyL

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) June 9, 2019

If you’re the type of person who wants America to shift dramatically to the left, you should probably support Mr Sanders. If you want a female president, you can choose between Ms Warren, Kamala Harris and Amy Klobuchar. If you want a younger leader, Mr Buttigieg scratches that itch.

You will struggle to come up with an exciting reason to vote for Joe Biden, apart from the polls showing him so far ahead of Mr Trump. And those polls could be a mirage; a simple example of people picking the name they recognise over the ones they don’t.

When the first debates between the Democratic candidates start next week, we will get a better idea of just how solid Mr Biden’s support is.

Whatever the answer, it would be a mistake for Democrats to fall in line behind him without testing him properly first, because he appears to be a deeply flawed candidate.

Let’s start with the obvious: Mr Biden is old. Older than Mr Trump. Much older than Ronald Reagan was in 1980. He would be 78 when sworn into office, and could potentially remain president until the age of 86.

Age is not in itself a bad thing — some would call it experience — but it would be ironic for the same people who complain about “old white men” running the Republican party to support the oldest ever president.

And naturally, some of Mr Biden’s views are rather old-fashioned. For instance, earlier this month he told the brothers of a 13-year-old girl it was their job to “keep the guys away from your sister”. In the past he’s talked about his desire to “beat the hell out of” Mr Trump.

Those sorts of comments would not have raised any eyebrows when Mr Biden first entered politics, but they’re unsettling now.

No spring chicken. Picture: Getty/AFP

The Democrats lost in 2016, at least in part, because voters perceived Hillary Clinton as a member of the so-called “establishment”, and saw Mr Trump as an outsider.

Well, Mr Biden is the walking definition of an insider. He has been in Washington for most of the last 50 years, having joined the Senate in 1973. He’s run for president multiple times, without any success so far — until this year, he had never risen above 5 per cent in a Democratic primary.

Mr Trump is already trying out lines attacking Mr Biden as a creature of the political “swamp”, referring to him mockingly as “swampman”.

Then there is the current President’s unfortunate habit of lying, which has frustrated Democrats endlessly. Their arguments for greater honesty from the White House could be undermined if they choose Mr Biden.

Recently a clip surfaced of him saying this: “When I marched in the civil rights movement, I did not march with a 12-point program. I marched with tens of thousands of others to change attitudes. And we changed attitudes.”

The problem? Mr Biden never marched in the civil rights movement. It’s the sort of baffling, easily disprovable lie Mr Trump is infamous for.

On top of that, much has quite rightly been made of Mr Trump’s attitude towards women. A dozen women accused him of inappropriate sexual conduct during the 2016 campaign. It’s a favourite topic of Democrats who believe Mr Trump’s personal behaviour is beneath his office.

Again, Mr Biden would struggle to make the point effectively, because he himself has a history of inappropriate behaviour — some have called it “handsiness” — around women.

When several women spoke out about their uncomfortable interactions with Mr Biden earlier this year, he released a video defending himself, but promising to be more “mindful” of other people’s space.

Whatever he says, you can expect the Trump campaign and its surrogates to keep releasing political ads like this one.

When the media assesses political candidates, the word “electability” comes up a lot. Whoever is leading in the polls tends to be considered strong on that measure — just look at Hillary Clinton in 2016 — and a self-perpetuating cycle ensues.

It is already starting to happen here. Joe Biden is considered the most electable challenger for Donald Trump, so he goes up in the polls. Which then makes him seem even more electable. Which makes him rise in the polls again. And so on.

Maybe Mr Biden really is the best option for Democrats. But Donald Trump has a superb instinct for sensing and exploiting his political opponents’ weaknesses, and Mr Biden has plenty.

His party would be wise to consider other candidates before leaping on the bandwagon.