On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” NBC Analyst and former Obama White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs stated that in order for President Joe Biden’s poll numbers on the economy to improve, “the economy is going to have to improve. You can’t simply talk your way into a better economy.” And that while there are strong jobs numbers, “interest rates are up. Inflation is still higher than most people, obviously, would like it.”
Guest host Yasmin Vossoughian asked, “When you think about current President Joe Biden facing possibly candidate Trump, who has been criminally charged 90-plus times, indicted four times, and yet, it’s going to be incredibly close, and the question is, what is the Biden administration doing wrong at this point in this communication? You look at the economy. It is not landing. It is not resonating. And does he need to make the pivot [to] talking more about these indictments, and talking more about the electability issues because of what he has been criminally charged of?”
Gibbs answered, “I think there [are] a lot of things that the campaign is probably thinking through. First and foremost, I think the economy is going to have to improve. You can’t simply talk your way into a better economy. The job statistics are great. But interest rates are up. Inflation is still higher than most people, obviously, would like it. So, I think there’s time on that, because that election isn’t going to be held today. I don’t think, personally, that it makes a whole lot of sense for them to get into the personal and the indictments. I think you can talk about protecting democracy. I think you can talk about a whole lot of things, but I think the President interjecting himself into legal cases, particularly before they happen, is a dangerous precedent.”
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