President Biden told a gathering of Democratic governors that he should sleep more and work less, including limiting events after 8 p.m., according to two people who attended the meeting and several others briefed on the comments.
Wednesday’s remarks were an admission of exhaustion from the 81-year-old president during a meeting intended to reassure more than two dozen of his most important supporters that he is still leading the charge and can mount a strong campaign against him. former President Donald J. Trump.
Mr. Biden’s comments about needing a break came more quickly after The New York Times reported that current and former officials have noticed that hearing the president in recent months has become more frequent and clearer.
But Mr. Biden told the governor, some were in the other White House who participated almost, according to the White House, that he remained in the race.
He cited extensive foreign travel in the weeks leading up to the debate, which the White House and its allies have undertaken in recent years as a reason to hold off on the debate. At first, Mr. Biden’s campaign blamed the cold, citing the mid-debate amid numerous social media posts asking why Mr. Biden was struggling.
Mr. Biden said he told his staff he needed to get more sleep, saying many people knew what happened at the meeting. He repeatedly cited being too pushy and not listening to his team about his schedule, and said he should work less and avoid events after 8 p.m., according to one person familiar with what happened at the meeting.
After Governor Josh Green of Hawaii, a physician, asked Mr. Biden about his health status, Mr. Biden replied that he was in good health. “It’s just my brain,” he said, according to three people with knowledge of what happened — saying some in the room thought it was a joke, but at least the governor was clueless and confused.
Jen O’Malley Dillon, Mr. Biden’s campaign chairman, who attended the meeting, said in a statement that he had said, “It was all a joke,” a recall confirmed by another person briefed on the meeting. O’Malley Dillon added: “He was obviously joking.”
Mr. Biden took two foreign trips in the week before the debate, but then spent a week preparing for the debate at Camp David with a group of advisers. One person close to Mr. Biden said the comments about sleep and work hours reflected the fact that during the training session, which took place immediately after the foreign trip, he was involved in many official duties on top of his campaign activities.
Many of the governors who attended the meeting expressed disappointment after there was no debate on whether Mr. Biden should continue his 2024 presidential campaign — a topic discussed at length during a call to governors on Monday.
Mr. Biden admitted to two allies that he knew he could not save his candidacy for a second term if he could not show his ability to voters after the debate. He sought to reassure concerned campaign aides on the phone Wednesday before a meeting with governors, saying he was in the race to stay.
But the fact that Mr. Biden began the conversation with the governors by saying that he was going to continue to walk made some participants feel that further discussion about the state of play has cooled.
Mr. Biden told a Milwaukee radio station in an interview made public on Wednesday that he had a “bad night.” In a pre-recorded interview with radio host Earl Ingram, Mr. Biden added, “The truth is I messed up. I was wrong.”
Mr. Biden also told the governor that he had been examined by a doctor in the days after the debate because of a cold that he had suffered and that he was not feeling well, many people knew what was going on. Politico reported earlier the examination of Mr. Biden, which the White House said was brief and not a full physical.
White House spokesman Andrew Bates confirmed that Mr. Biden had seen the White House doctor for a cold check. But on Friday, the White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, said the opposite, telling reporters that Mr. Biden had not had a medical examination since February.
