Observers have been sounding off over how late in the evening President Joe Biden gave his address to the Democratic National Convention Monday night.
The 81-year-old commander-in-chief was originally scheduled to begin his remarks at 9:30 p.m. CT, however, his speech was pushed back an hour, and he did not finish until after 11 p.m.
“The media is very East Coast focused though, you’ve gotta be pretty naive to think the prolonged DNC tonight is for any reason other than diminishing Biden’s visibility,” wrote FiveThirtyEight pollster Nate Silver on X.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, Biden’s embarrassingly bad debate performance against former President Donald Trump in late June resulted in a groundswell of calls from Democratic donors and officials for Biden to step aside and end his re-election bid.
During the aftermath of the debate and amid speculation Biden’s cognitive decline was so great he needed to drop out of the race, the president told a group of Democratic governors that he needed to stop scheduling events after 8 p.m. so he could get more rest and sleep, according to ABC News.
“I’m tapping out – I can’t stay up this late, we all have lives and kids. God speed to our 81 year old President getting through the speech at this hour,” wrote former The View co-host Meghan McCain on X. “Whatever producers did this to him and let it go over this long at this hour is an a*****e and it is disrespectful to Biden.”
Similar remarks were expressed by OutKick founder Clay Travis.
“Democrats kicked Joe Biden out of the presidential race and now they aren’t even going to let him speak until after 11 pm eastern on the first night of the convention. Diabolical. They are nasty and play to win,” he wrote on X.
The president made headlines Monday night for some of his remarks, particularly a comment in which he appeared to agree with the anti-Israel protesters demonstrating outside the DNC in Chicago, as previously relayed by The Dallas Express.
“Those, those protesters out in the street, they have a point,” Biden said, per Fox News. “A lot of innocent people are being killed on both sides.”