WASHINGTON (Reuters) – While President Donald Trump traveled to the battleground state of Arizona this week, his Democratic opponent for the White House, Joe Biden, campaigned from his basement as he has done throughout the coronavirus pandemic.
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump looks at an assembly line machine manufacturing protective masks being shown to him by Honeywell’s Vice President of Integrated Supply Chain Tony Stallings during a tour of Honeywell’s facility manufacturing masks for the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Phoenix, Arizona, U.S., May 5, 2020. REUTERS/Tom Brenner/File Photo
Those optics have some Democrats increasingly concerned.
The freeze on in-person campaigning during the outbreak has had an upside for Biden, giving the former vice president more time to court donors and shielding him from on-the-trail gaffes.
But the coronavirus lockdown also has deprived Biden of chances to showcase what allies see as his major asset contrasting with Republican Trump in a time of crisis: his empathetic personality.
“I personally would like to see him out more because he’s in his element when he’s meeting people,” said Tom Sacks-Wilner, a fundraiser for Biden who is on the campaign’s finance committee.
With Biden badly overshadowed by Trump and a few national opinion polls showing his lead ahead of the Nov. 3 election slipping, some Democratic operatives are urging the Biden campaign to boost his profile, worried the broadcasts from his basement in Delaware are falling short.
Onetime campaign advisers to former President Barack Obama penned two op-eds this week calling on Biden to raise the tempo of his campaign through more robust digital operations and help from celebrities, former rivals and Democratic governors at the forefront of the pandemic response.
Several allies also are encouraging Biden’s team to consider visits such as to essential workers, if those could be done safely and in line with public health guidance.
“The Biden campaign is going to have to think about ways in which they can drive the news every day, and that is a challenge during the crisis,” said Joel Benenson,