Howard Dean on Biden: Others Who Were ‘Much More Seriously Disabled Than This’ Were ‘Able to Run the Country’

On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “The Beat,” former DNC Chair Howard Dean said that he thinks President Joe Biden can be President for another four years and “There have been people who have been much more seriously disabled than this, and they’ve been able to run the country. He has a great staff. His list of real achievements, turning around a lot of the damage that Trump did is extraordinary in the last four years.”

Dean said, “[I]s Biden qualified, and could he run the country for another four years? I think the answer to that is absolutely yes. There’s not a question in my mind. There have been people who have been much more seriously disabled than this, and they’ve been able to run the country. He has a great staff. His list of real achievements, turning around a lot of the damage that Trump did is extraordinary in the last four years. And I have no doubt, that he — especially on the international scene, where Trump, after four years, essentially has no experience, because he doesn’t like experience, Biden is the right guy.”

He continued, “Now, here is the big, big problem: As you very well know, politics is much more about perception than it often is about reality. And I think most people who are upset about Biden are not upset because they don’t like Biden. They’re upset because they’re afraid we’re going to lose to Trump. And the perception that Biden has got some cognitive deficiencies and so forth and so on, that has no effect on his presidency, but people look at that, and then, of course, the Republicans hype it up as much as they possibly can, and they go, wait a minute, this is coupled by a major factor that has nothing to do with Biden or Trump, except that they’re there, and that is, our generation needed to get the hell out of politics before we did. … So, it would have been much better if we’d had a bunch of people who were 45 years old running for president. But we didn’t, because they weren’t going to challenge an incumbent President with a very good record. So, now what we have, Ari, is a situation where the perceptions have overtaken the reality, and we could lose to Donald Trump.”

Dean later added that the perception of Biden isn’t fair.

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett