WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump is trusted more than Democratic nominee Joe Biden to handle the economy, polls show, even with more than 40 million Americans filing jobless claims and growth stalled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
FILE PHOTO: Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden is seen at War Memorial Plaza during Memorial Day, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in New Castle, Delaware, U.S. May 25, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo
Some Biden supporters fear that vulnerability could intensify if Trump becomes the face of an economic recovery as the country re-opens after shutdowns, giving the Republican president’s re-election prospects a boost when he needs it most.
Biden is expected to release a large-scale recovery plan in the coming weeks. Democrats are watching closely to see if his message matches the moment, saying the party’s presumptive nominee needs to ramp up criticism of Trump’s response to the pandemic and show leadership for moving forward.
Biden, who has held online events from home during the shutdown, “stayed in his basement and did the proper thing, but now it’s different,” said a leading Democrat in Michigan’s Macomb County, a suburban Detroit county critical to Biden’s hopes of taking the state back after Trump’s 2016