This is how Biden plans his presidential re-election campaign with 80 years: "He is very busy exercising his office"

By Alex Seitz-Wald - NBC News

He is 80 years old. He has a demanding job. And, for starters, he's never been the most electric fieldman in the world. To win re-election, President Joe Biden is planning to turn to a broad group of friends and allies to go where he can't, say what he won't say, and be what he never will be.

Campaign substitutes are nothing new. William McKinley deployed 1,400 during his campaign for the White House in 1896, as he greeted supporters from the porch of his Ohio home.

But Biden's fledgling re-election campaign has invested early — even before it had a headquarters and earlier than former President Barack Obama did in 2012 — in what veterans say is an unusually robust operation to harness the power of Democratic Party stars, most of whom reside outside the White House.

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"President Biden, as he has shown this week, is very busy in office," said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Delaware, a co-chair of the campaign, who was one of several replacements who made themselves available to cable news anchors and other journalists while Biden was abroad last week. "Our president has assembled a group that includes up-and-coming leaders from across the country," he said.

At best, campaign surrogates are a win-win: the campaign gains strength multipliers, validators, and access to its grassroots networks. The substitutes, on the other hand, get important entries, a little prominence and some coins.

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But surrogates also have their own interests and proclivities and a well-documented tendency to go off script. And an over-reliance on them could expose Biden to criticism that he's repeating the so-called "basement campaign" of 2020 because he can't or won't get in the ring himself. (Former President Donald Trump frequently mocked Biden for not campaigning anymore.)

"Part of a re-election campaign means that the president is actively governing as president. That is the reality. So I think addressing reality intelligently means you have to tap into networks and other voices in the party," said a source familiar with campaign planning, who was granted anonymity to discuss the inner workings.

The campaign said it has already coordinated more than 185 interviews across a wide range of national and local media outlets in both English and Spanish, a broad-spectrum cross-platform approach they hope will help the message break through a fractured media landscape.

The campaign's main replacements — its six co-chairs and the 50-member National Advisory Board, plus Vice President Kamala Harris — were chosen not just out of loyalty, stature or political needs, but because everyone agreed to be available and get the job done.

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"We expect to be very active," said Democratic politician Maxwell Frost, 26, a freshman progressive and rising star of the left. "It's definitely more than a list of 50 names. I think the president really wants to put together a team that is willing to work," he added.

That will mean appearing at in-person fundraisers and events, participating in media interviews, posting on social media, and tapping into your own local support networks. Administration officials and many others will also be included, such as when Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg appeared at a recent Biden fundraiser in New York.

President Joe Biden speaks during a press briefing in Hiroshima, Japan, Sunday, May 21, 2023, following the G-7 Summit. Susan Walsh / AP

Jim Messina, who ran Obama's re-election campaign, said surrogates are critical to fundraising efforts and as external validators for an increasingly politically cynical electorate. And the sheer number of media outlets and social media platforms these days means the campaign needs a lot of help to reach all of them.

"What's true, and this wasn't true ten years ago, is that you can't just recycle the usual talking points. That won't go viral, it won't break through. You need people who speak with their own voice," Messina said. "Will it always work? There will be times when someone says something you wish you wouldn't have said exactly like that, of course. But overall, this will be more real and authentic," he said.

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Frost is one of several members of Biden's advisory council who come from a different ideological wing of the party or have even criticized him at times, along with household names such as Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Ro Khanna, D-Calif.

"I still think it's our best bet in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin to win those states," Khanna, who has been traveling to Iowa and New Hampshire with an eye toward a possible presidential bid, said on NBC News' "Meet the Press" last month.

Also on the list are the two Democratic officials who last year appeared closest to challenging Biden in the primaries, California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, following Lyndon Johnson's philosophy of keeping his enemies close. The list also includes potential future presidential candidates, such as Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan.

"He's making a concerted effort to appeal to everybody," said Chris Huntley, a speechwriter and Democratic strategist. "There's nothing wrong with bringing together the Avengers [referring to Marvel superheroes] surrogates, who all have different powers and different abilities... showing the present and future of our party," he said.

Four years ago, Republicans scoffed and Democrats worried about Biden's "basement campaign," when the candidate largely avoided in-person rallies in favor of Zoom meetings and recorded video messages. And he wouldn't be the first sitting president to run a "Rose Garden campaign," more focused on governing from the White House than campaigning in an indecisive state.

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Of course, Biden's low-profile campaign won in 2020 and most presidents are re-elected, with the most recent exception, Trump, who was the sitting president who campaigned the most.

Biden's heavy reliance on surrogates is sure to face similar criticism this time around, especially as Trump and other conservatives argue that Biden lacks the physical and mental vitality for the job.

But his allies say the president should try to stay out of the campaign and leave them the harder job of responding to Trump and other Republicans.

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"I think you're going to see a real team effort to support the president and be able to get his message out to the world, so that everything doesn't depend on him alone," Jeffrey Katzenberg, a Hollywood mogul and major Democratic donor who is also a co-chair of Biden's campaign, said in an interview. "I think that's the most important thing he can do as far as his re-election bid: do what he's been doing. Unlike the person who last occupied the White House," he said.

But relying on others to do the work for you has its limitations, as evidenced this month when New York Mayor Eric Adams was not included on Biden's advisory committee after criticizing the White House's handling of immigrants, though the campaign says he remains a supporter and is still seen as a replacement.

And surrogates, especially politicians, sometimes come with their own parochial demands. For example, Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams told Biden's 2020 campaign that she would only agree to be a surrogate if they agreed to invest millions to try to win her state, according to her former campaign manager.

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Frost said he has been pushing to make sure Florida remains a priority for the campaign, even as some Democrats say Biden should rule out the extremely expensive state that has aligned with Republicans in recent years. "If you look at the numbers, Florida is a state you don't want to give up. I have made that argument and many people have reassured me," he said.

He's happy to have the opportunity to make that case, even if it means constantly talking about Florida's Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, who just entered the presidential race. "I already talk about DeSantis almost every day, and I expect that to continue," Frost said.