Joe Biden warns of Trump's 'dark vision' amid more calls for him to drop out of race

WASHINGTON – Facing pressure from members of his own party to drop out of the race, President Joe Biden said he looks forward to getting back on the campaign trail next week and warned that Donald Trump’s acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention offered a “dark vision” for the country.

“Last night the American people saw the same Donald Trump they rejected four years ago,” Biden said in a statement Friday. “For over 90 minutes, he focused on his own grievances, with no plan to unite us and no plan to make life better for working people.”

Biden, who is isolating at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, while recovering from COVID-19, insisted he would beat Trump in November despite polls showing him losing to his Republican opponent.

“Donald Trump’s dark vision for the future is not who we are as Americans,” he said. “Together, as a party and as a country, we can and will defeat him at the ballot box.”

Biden said he would return to the campaign trail next week to expose “the threat of Donald Trump’s Project 2025 agenda” and make the case for his own vision and record – “one where we save our democracy, protect our rights and freedoms, and create opportunity for everyone.”

Trump, formally accepting the GOP nomination for president, delivered a 90-minute speech Thursday during the closing night of the party’s convention in Milwaukee. His remarks focused heavily on immigration, with Trump saying he would reinstate several of the hard-line border policies from his first term in office. He also criticized Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas war, claiming that he could “stop wars with a telephone call.”

For his part, Biden’s COVID-19 diagnosis has sidelined him at a crucial moment for his reelection campaign. More Democratic lawmakers called on Friday for him to drop out of the race, including Sen. Martin Henrich of New Mexico.

Heinrich, who is up for reelection in November, called Biden “one of the most accomplished presidents in modern history” but said it is in the country’s best interest for him to step down so the party could unite behind a candidate who could beat Trump.

Biden has resisted efforts to push him out of the race. His campaign chair, Jen O’Malley Dillon, said Friday in an interview on MSNBC that he is “absolutely” still in the race and “more committed than ever” to beating Trump.

But Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., one of Biden's closest allies, said Friday on CNN that the president “is weighing what he should weigh, which is ‘Who is the best candidate to win in November?’”

Michael Collins covers the White House. Follow him on X @mcollinsNEWS.