Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden says President Donald Trump can still win the 2020 election because delegitimizing the race’s outcome is “how he plays.”
“I’m one of those folks, or competitors, it’s not over till the bell rings. And I feel superstitious when I predict anything other than going to be a hard fight,” Biden said in an interview aired on CBS’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday when asked whether Trump could still defeat him. “We feel good about where we are. But, you know, I don’t underestimate how he plays.”
Biden said Trump is “trying to sort of delegitimize the election,” and that those efforts are “all I think designed to make people wonder whether or not they should, whether it’s worth going to vote. Just the intimidation factor.”
Trump has long sought to cast doubt on the legitimacy of mail-in ballots, repeatedly making false claims about how they are cast and counted.
“What really has pleased me is the overwhelming turnout in the states that have early voting,” Biden said.
View Trump and Biden head-to-head polling
Biden’s comments come as polls show him leading nationally and in nearly every swing state. In a sign of Biden’s confidence, his campaign has added a Tuesday trip to Georgia for Biden and a Friday trip to Texas for his running mate, California Sen. Kamala Harris. Biden doesn’t need either state to cross the 270-vote threshold, but a late push by his campaign could help down-ballot Democrats in House, Senate and state legislative races.
“I hope there’s going to be a lot of people who vote for me because of who I am,” Biden said. “But I think the contrast between Donald Trump and me is about as stark as it can get in terms of our value set and how we view the world.”
In the interview, Biden also defended several policy proposals that Trump and Republicans have attacked in an effort to cast him as too liberal.
Biden has said those making more than $400,000 per year and corporations should see their income taxes increase. But he said no one making less than $400,000 would pay “a penny more under my proposal.”
“That’s a guarantee, a promise,” he said. “I give you my word as a Biden. That’s an absolute guarantee.”
He said he isn’t hesitant to increase taxes on wealthier people even with the economy battered by the coronavirus pandemic.
“Depending who you’re raising them on,” he said. “Look, if you’re raising them on somebody who’s making $1 billion a year, it’s not a problem that they pay 39.6%, which everybody should pay, raise another $90 billion.”
CBS interviewer Norah O’Donnell asked Biden about Trump and the GOP’s efforts to portray him as a tool of his party’s more progressive factions, led by two Democratic presidential primary rivals that Biden defeated, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, as well as New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
“He’d love to run against them, wouldn’t he?” Biden said. “Mr. President, you’re running against Joe Biden. Joe Biden has a deep, steep, and successful record over a long, long time.”
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