Democratic strategist James Carville slammed President Joe Biden‘s decision not to sit down for an interview prior to the Super Bowl, saying it shows a lack of confidence to perform well.
Carville noted the massive television audience of the Super Bowl, which has regularly exceeded 100 million viewers several times in recent years, and questioned why the White House turned down the opportunity, while speaking on CNN on Saturday.
“It’s the biggest television audience — not even close — and you get a chance to do a 20, 25-minute interview on that day,” Carville said. “And you don’t do it? That’s a kind of sign that the staff or yourself doesn’t have much confidence in you. There’s no other way to read this.”
Biden is skipping an interview with CBS, which airs the Super Bowl domestically this year after he also opted not to sit down for an interview with Fox before its broadcast of the big game in 2023. Last year’s Super Bowl saw an audience of roughly 115.1 million people.
The president did participate in Super Bowl interviews in the first two years of his term, with CBS and NBC in 2021 and 2022, respectively. The pregame interview has become a recent tradition in the past two decades, with then-President Donald Trump’s decision not to participate in an interview with NBC in 2018 — over a feud with the network’s coverage of him — being the most recent snub prior to Biden’s consecutive skips.
Carville predicted that Biden will not debate his Republican opponent ahead of the November election while also saying how age does not get better with time.
“And he’s not going to do debates,” Carville said. “He is old; I know what it is because I’m almost as old as he is, and it’s never going to get better.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Biden’s age and mental acuity have been under scrutiny for much of his presidency after several gaffes and apparent lapses, but those concerns came to a head last week after a scathing report from Special Counsel Robert Hur detailed concerns over Biden’s memory and mental acuity.
The president and the White House have both denied the characterization of Biden’s mental state by the special counsel, with Biden saying in an evening press conference on Thursday that his memory was fine.