A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
President Biden's fitness for office has been questioned since that debate two weeks ago, and that scrutiny has not eased up.
SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:
No, it hasn't. Many fellow Democrats have asked him to remove his name from the November ballot. And Democrats and Republicans alike were closely watching a news conference last night where Biden, early on, made this stumble.
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PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: I wouldn't have picked Vice President Trump to be vice president if I think she was not qualified to be president.
PFEIFFER: Of course, he meant to say Vice President Harris.
MARTÍNEZ: There were also a lot of questions about whether Harris would be a better candidate this time around. NPR White House correspondent Asma Khalid was there. Wow. Must-see TV yesterday, Asma. What did the president say last night?
ASMA KHALID, BYLINE: Well, he said a lot, A. You know, he doesn't do a whole lot of solo press conferences. This was, in fact, the first one that he did since last year. It was substantive. He took questions from a total of 11 reporters, including myself. He spoke for nearly an hour. And I will say a lot of the questions centered around his presidential candidacy and whether he ought to drop out or whether he'd allow for his pledged delegates at the Democratic Convention to potentially vote for someone else. Here's how he answered that.
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BIDEN: And so tomorrow, if all of a sudden, I show up at the convention, everybody says, we want somebody else, that's the Democratic process. (Whispering) It's not going to happen.
KHALID: You know, I think broadly, he made it clear that he's staying in this presidential race. I asked him directly about something that he said back during the 2020 campaign. He had referred to himself as a bridge candidate, a transition to a younger generation of Democrats. He insisted that the gravity of the situation had changed. He said he would not drop out of the race, even if his team hypothetically showed him that his vice president, Kamala Harris, could fare better against Trump.
MARTÍNEZ: OK. Now, there was a lot at stake for President Biden last night. So how did he do?
KHALID: Well, there was that notable stumble you mentioned right out of the gate, where he misspoke about his vice president. Earlier in the day, also at a NATO event, he mistakenly referred to Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as President Putin. I was in the room for that, and I will say it was visibly awkward, where a number of European leaders were on stage, and people in the room gasped. But throughout the press conference itself, Biden, you know, he remained calm. He didn't lose his temper, even when he was asked some personal questions, like whether he ought to have more neurological testing or whether he was bringing down the standing of the United States in the world. I will say, A, there were a lot of eyes, as we all know, on Biden last night. And the big question was whether this debate performance would exacerbate or alleviate Democratic angst in the Democratic Party.
MARTÍNEZ: OK. So on that, Asma, I mean, did this buy him some time with his own party?
KHALID: I think we'll have to see how the party responds in the coming hours. I mean, will one presser really alleviate the concerns from that poor debate? I don't know. After the debate, another Congressman publicly said for the first time that Biden should step down. That's Jim Himes of Connecticut. He's the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. He said he did not think Biden could beat Trump. You know, the president is headed to the key battleground state of Michigan today for a campaign event, and he's got a big TV interview on Monday. A lot of eyes are going to be on him for every event and interview that he's giving in the coming days. And a key question I have is if the performance last night is sufficient for Biden's team, if it sort of emboldens him while at the same time not erasing the concerns people in his party have, which keeps the focus on Biden at a time when Democrats want this election to be focused on the Republican opponent, Donald Trump.
MARTÍNEZ: That's NPR's Asma Khalid. Thank you very much.
KHALID: Good to talk to you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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