Biden responds to his critics with defiance. But they see him in denial.

A week after his disastrous debate performance and with doubts growing within his party about his ability to defeat former President Donald Trump in November, Biden has adopted a one-word strategy to keep his candidacy alive: defiance.

Many Democrats, on the contrary, believe that he is in denial.

Whatever his personal thoughts on his current situation, his public persona is one of fierce determination. He has no patience for the skeptics and critics who, after watching him falter in front of 50 million viewers during the debate, wonder whether he has the mental agility and physical strength to keep Trump out of the White House, much less stay in office for another four years.

Biden is dismissive of those who want him out, almost daring them to come out from behind their anonymous press quotes and make their case publicly, attaching their names. A few of them have done so, but Biden insists that they represent only a small fraction of his party.

That’s the Biden who showed up Friday. At a rally in Madison, Wisconsin, where he delivered a fiery speech, he threw down the gauntlet. He recalled the Atlanta debate, where he struggled with his choice of words, missed opportunities to make his case against Trump and at times seemed to have completely lost his train of thought.

“Since then,” he said, “there’s been a lot of speculation. What’s Joe going to do? Is he going to stay in the race? Is he going to drop out?” Well, here’s my answer: I’m running and I’m going to win again!

Later, in an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that aired in prime time Friday night, he was asked repeatedly what he would do if his party leaders came to tell him he had to resign. He called the question hypothetical and declined to answer.

He said he had spoken with House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.), whose members are wondering whether Biden will dash their hopes of regaining the majority; Senate Democratic leader Charles E. Schumer (N.Y.), who is at risk of Republicans reclaiming the majority in his chamber; and Rep. James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.), who saved Biden’s candidacy in the 2020 primary but has also indicated he would support Vice President Harris if Biden were to step down.

“They all said I should stay in the race,” Biden told Stephanopoulos.

Biden said the Democratic governors were all for him. After all, he said, he met with them on Wednesday and they are all behind him. But that overstates the degree of unanimity among the governors.

Earlier Friday, Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey issued a statement saying Biden should “carefully evaluate whether he remains our best hope of defeating Donald Trump.” Other governors have been reluctant to speak publicly but have indicated privately that they share Healey’s view. And at Wednesday’s meeting, for example, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and Maine Gov. Janet Mills reportedly told Biden they were concerned he would lose their states, which were solidly in Biden’s column four years ago.

Asked on the Wisconsin tarmac about a Washington Post report that Democratic Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) tried to gather a group of senators to go to him and urge him to step down, Biden told reporters, “He’s the only one.” That assertion ignores the personal concerns the senators have shared among themselves. Meanwhile, in the House of Representatives, several Democrats have publicly called on Biden to step down.

What could persuade the president to see things differently? Biden gave an answer to that question in his ABC interview: “If the Lord Almighty came down and said, ‘Joe, get out of the race,’ I would get out of the race,” he said. He added, “The Lord Almighty is not coming down.”

Several media outlets, including the Washington Post, have recently published stories quoting people who have met with the president and who say they have observed signs of accelerated aging in recent months, including more frequent relapses. Few quotes have been published, except for those of administration officials offered to reporters by the White House to vouch for the president’s physical fitness.

Pressed repeatedly by Stephanopoulos to take a cognitive test, Biden declined to answer definitively. “I take a cognitive test every day,” he said, alluding to the rigors of the presidency. “Every day, I take that test. Everything I do. You know, not only am I campaigning, I’m leading the world.” He immediately amended that sentence to say that the United States is the “essential” nation in the world.

Biden urged voters who made him the Democratic nominee in this year’s primary not to be persuaded by strategists, donors and anonymous party officials to deny him what they gave him. “Despite that, some people don’t seem to care who you voted for. Well, guess what? They’re trying to take me out of the race. Well, let me say it as clearly as I can: I’m still in the race. I will beat Donald Trump.”

But voters who haven’t seen him up close or in private meetings have nonetheless concluded that he’s unfit to last four more years in the White House. A Wall Street Journal poll released Wednesday found that 76 percent of Democrats think he’s too old to run. About two in three say they would prefer another Democrat as their nominee. A New York Times/Siena College poll found that 74 percent of voters overall think he’s too old, including 59 percent of Democrats.

In a conversation with Stephanopoulos, the president seemed in denial about the state of the race, especially compared to where he stood at this point four years ago. David Axelrod, the Democratic strategist, wrote on X: “The president is rightfully proud of his record. But he is dangerously out of touch with the concerns people have about his ability to move forward and where he stands in this race.”

Today, he is trailing Trump in national polls and is slightly worse off than he was before the debate. Those polls measure the popular vote. His position in the battleground states that will determine who wins the Electoral College is generally worse.

Four years ago, Biden was consistently leading Trump in national polls. A Washington Post-ABC News poll in mid-July 2020 showed Biden leading Trump 55% to 40%. He went on to win by four percentage points and 7 million votes nationally. Biden won 306 electoral votes, well over the 270 needed to win, but in four of the six battlegrounds he won, his margin was a percentage point or less.

The 2020 polls consistently underestimated support for Trump, and pollsters have sought to improve their methodology. But by all measures, Biden’s results are worse this year.

As one Democratic strategist, who served in a previous administration and requested anonymity to give his candid assessment, said after watching Biden’s ABC News interview: “He was better than the debate, but I don’t think he answered the big questions for a lot of Democrats: Can he make a powerful, compelling, relentless argument against Trump?”

Members of Congress, who are clearly nervous about Biden as their nominee, will return to Washington next week and discuss further among themselves what, if anything, they should do. Major donors will decide whether to continue funding Biden’s campaign unchanged or to reduce their contributions. More polls will be released that could challenge – or support – Biden’s arguments in his favor.

Even before the 2024 campaign began, Biden silenced those who questioned whether he should run again. No prominent Democrat stepped up to face him in the primaries, despite concerns about his ability to take on Trump. The concerns are far greater now than they were then.

Biden and the Democrats who want him out are now on a collision course. Will those who want him out keep up the pressure, privately or publicly? Or will they back down in the face of Biden’s claim that he’s in the running to stay?

This period could be much more divisive and contentious than the period following the end of the debate. Whatever the outcome of the campaign, it carries more risks than good options – and there is not much time left to resolve the issues and set a course for the final months of the campaign.