With less than 10 months to go until the 2024 election, the nerve center of President Biden’s bid for a second term is stationed not at his campaign’s headquarters in Delaware but within feet of the Oval Office.
The president and his chief strategist, Mike Donilon, have repeatedly discussed when to move him over to the campaign — perhaps after the 2022 midterm elections, then after the 2023 off-year elections and again at the end of 2023. Each time, no move happened after the president told aides he wanted to keep Mr. Donilon within walking distance.
Anita Dunn, the longtime Democratic operative who stepped in to help revive Mr. Biden’s fledging operation four years ago, is crafting the re-election message again, even as she oversees communications at the White House. Jen O’Malley Dillon, Mr. Biden’s deputy White House chief of staff and former campaign manager, is also splitting her day job with her role as one of the most powerful voices in the campaign.
So far, almost none of the people in the president’s inner circle have left for campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Del., prompting some donors and strategists to worry that too much of Mr. Biden’s team remains cloistered inside the White House. Less than a year before Election Day, the president has a campaign with two distinct centers of gravity, advisers juggling two jobs at once, and months of internal debate about when to consolidate everyone in one place.
A spokesman for the campaign dismissed concerns about the campaign structure, noting that past presidents had sometimes left top political advisers in the White House.
“We invite everyone concerned about the existential threat that Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans pose to our freedom and democracy to channel their energy toward organizing, donating and talking to their friends about the stakes of this election,” said Kevin Munoz, the spokesman.
But the situation has led anxious Democrats, including some inside the campaign itself, to privately and publicly prod Mr. Biden to step on the gas. That includes former President Barack Obama, who discussed the urgency of the 2024 election and the structure of the president’s campaign with Mr. Biden in November, according to several people familiar with the discussion. The Washington Post first reported the conversation.
In interviews with more than a dozen Democratic operatives, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss campaign strategy, several said they worried that a bifurcated campaign was contributing to a slow start to what should be a furious battle for a second term. John Morgan, one of Mr. Biden’s top donors, said the hand-wringing was coming from Democrats who are terrified because of polls showing razor-thin margins for Mr. Biden in battleground states, as well as the potency of former President Donald J. Trump’s candidacy.
“That’s why you hear so much, you know, back-seat driving,” Mr. Morgan said. “Because we all think we have the answer. And, you know, the campaign gets sick of hearing from donors and political operatives and so-called experts.”
