By Trevor Hunnicutt and Nandita Bose
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden suggested on Wednesday that he could defeat Donald Trump again in a 2024 rematch, and warned the former Republican president was a threat to the country.
One day after launching his re-election bid, Biden marked the occasion not on the campaign trail but in a Rose Garden news conference following a meeting with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol.
A reporter pressed the Democratic president on whether he was running for re-election because he believed he was the only one who could beat Trump.
“I may not be the only one, but I know him well and I know the danger he presents to our democracy,” Biden said. “We’ve been down this road before.”
Biden’s Tuesday launch video included imagery from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump’s supporters and included pledges to protect American liberties from “extremists” linked to the former president.
Biden said he ran in 2020 because of what he described as a unique threat posed by Trump. Now, he says his decision to run again isn’t connected to Trump.
“I think I still would be running if he wasn’t,” Biden said of Trump, who has already announced his candidacy, along with several other Republican hopefuls.
Biden added that he took a “hard look” at whether his age, 80, should factor into whether he decided to run and that he expected voters to look fairly at the same issue.
“I took a hard look before I decided to run and I feel good, I feel excited about the prospects and I think we’re on the verge of really turning the corner in a way we haven’t in a long time.”
The president said there is more he needs to do to position the United States so it is “economically and politically secure for a long time.”
“He doesn’t know me at all,” Trump said of Biden in an interview with WABC radio in New York, adding that the Biden administration is “destroying America.”
FUNDRAISING REVS UP
Biden and Democratic groups that use the ActBlue fundraising platform to collect small-dollar contributions gathered at least $6 million in the 24 hours following the campaign launch, according to a Reuters analysis.
The figure is not a comprehensive estimate of what the campaign raised as it includes other Democratic groups and excludes some sources of Biden fundraising. A spokesperson for Biden’s campaign declined to comment.
Voters who supported Biden’s campaign in 2020 have received at least four text messages and three emails since the launch requesting financial support.
A group of volunteers who bring in large sums by hosting private campaign functions with well-heeled donors are meeting on Friday with Biden and plan to start hosting events in the coming days. The campaign could raise and spend more than $1 billion before 2024.
“Ridin with Biden. Let’s go Joe,” wrote Alex Soros, son of the billionaire investor and liberal donor George Soros, on Twitter.
Earlier on Wednesday, Biden’s re-election campaign released its first advertisement for the 2024 cycle. It also features the Jan. 6 riots and focuses on gun violence, abortion and safeguarding democracy.
The campaign is spending more than $1 million to air the ad over two weeks on cable channels in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, each of which are key battleground states.
Priorities USA, a Democratic super political action committee (super PAC), announced it will spend $75 million toward digital ads in the six battleground states.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Nandita Bose in Washington; Editing by Heather Timmons, Alistair Bell and Lisa Shumaker)
