2016 repeat? Trump revives Clinton playbook to battle Biden

They’re painting Trump’s reaction as a tired play that will have little effect on voters who’ve watched three years of a scattershot presidency now struggling to handle the pandemic.“We have a president who doesn’t want to talk about the central issue in this campaign right now,” said Mike Donilon, one of Biden’s longest-serving advisers. “From his involvement in the unmasking of General Flynn to his son Hunter Biden repeatedly landing lucrative foreign business deals while his father was vice president, Joe Biden embodies the D.C. swamp,” said Trump campaign spokeswoman Sarah Matthews. They point to the Trump family’s ongoing business entanglements across the world while his daughter and son-in-law work in the White House to his weeks spent complimenting Chinese President Xi Jingping before blaming Beijing for the pandemic.In that environment, Biden’s team doesn’t believe a pervasive narrative like “Hillary’s emails” will shadow this campaign.“People have a really good understanding of who Joe Biden is,” Donilon said, arguing that Trump’s handling of the pandemic plays into arguments about experience, competence and temperament that Biden has made since he launched his bid last spring.