Joe Biden Calls President Trump ‘Erratic’ and ‘Vicious’ in First 2020 TV Ad

Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the Des Moines Register Soapbox during a visit to the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, Iowa, on Aug. 8, 2019. AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall

Former Vice President Joe Biden tried to paint Republican President Donald Trump as an erratic bully in Biden’s first television commercial since launching his 2020 campaign earlier this year.

Biden, considered one of the top Democratic contenders, kicked off his campaign with misleading statements about Trump that he was later given the opportunity to correct but instead doubled down on.

The narrator said in the 60-second television ad that Biden would “restore the soul of the nation battered by an erratic, vicious, bullying president.”

The spot kicked off with a montage of several faces and clips from Charlottesville, where white nationalists and leftist protesters clashed in 2017. A narrator says, “We know in our bones this election is different. The stakes are higher. The threat more serious.”

“We have to beat Donald Trump and all the polls agree Joe Biden is the strongest Democrat to do the job. No one is more qualified. For eight years President Obama and Vice President Biden were an administration America could be proud of,” the narrator adds.

The ad champions Obama and Biden for “[working] to save the American economy, to pass the historic Affordable Care Act” and says Biden “has a plan for America’s future, to build on Obamacare, not scrap it, to make a record investment in America’s schools, to lead the world on climate, to rebuild our alliance, and most of all, restore the soul of our nation.”

The advertisement will run in four cities in Iowa, including Des Moines, according to The Hill.

“Today’s ad in Iowa reinforces the enormous stakes of this election and makes a strong case for why Joe Biden is the best Democrat to take on Donald Trump next fall,” Biden’s campaign manager Greg Schultz said in a statement.

“This election is about restoring strong, steady and stable leadership back to the White House, and today’s ad demonstrates why Joe Biden is the candidate to do just that,” he added.

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters before boarding Air Force One in Morristown, N.J., on Aug. 18, 2019. Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images

Biden, 76, has been out of the public eye more in recent weeks after a string of statements that included getting locations wrong three times and saying “poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids.”

Biden also claimed he was vice president in 2018. He left office in early 2017.

Trump has hammered Biden on his flubs as well as his policy reversals as the field of Democratic contenders appears to be moving Biden left in some policy areas.

Trump told reporters at the White House he saw Biden’s “poor kids” comment and said to himself, “Whoa!”

“This is not somebody you can have as your president, but if he got the nomination, I’d be thrilled,” he said. “Joe Biden can’t answer a simple question; something’s gone wrong with him.”

A Biden spokeswoman said the former vice president “misspoke.”

Biden’s team has tried to put forth the idea that he has the best opportunity of anybody in the field to beat Trump.

Jill Biden, Biden’s wife, recently took to MSNBC to say: “I know that not all of you are committed to my husband, and I respect that, but I want you to think about your candidate, his or her electability, and who’s going to win this race.”

“I know my goal is to beat Donald Trump. We have to have someone who can beat him. So if you look at the polls, if you look at Joe with his record with independents,” she said.

“So yes, you know, your candidate might be better on, I don’t know, health care, than Joe is, but you’ve got to look at who’s going to win this election, and maybe you have to swallow a little bit and say, ‘OK, I personally like so-and-so better,’ but your bottom line has to be that we have to beat Trump.”