Biden tells Democratic governors he needs more sleep and plans to stop scheduling events after 8 p.m.

U.S. President Joe Biden told Democratic governors during a meeting at the White House on Wednesday that part of his plan going forward is to stop scheduling events after 8 p.m. so that he can get more sleep, according to three sources briefed on his comments.

U.S. President Joe Biden told Democratic governors during a meeting at the White House on Wednesday that part of his plan going forward is to stop scheduling events after 8 p.m. so that he can get more sleep, according to three sources briefed on his comments.

The remarks, first reported by The New York Times, came as the 81-year-old Biden sought to reassure a group of more than 20 state leaders about his ability to defeat former President Donald Trump in November and govern effectively for another four years.

Biden’s comment left several of the governors in the room frustrated, sources told CNN, and is one of the reasons that some of the participants have been rankled by the statement of loyalty and enthusiasm from them distributed by the Biden campaign on Thursday.

The White House did not immediately comment about what the president said. A Biden campaign aide argued that, as well as doing debate prep in the week after his two trips to Europe, Biden was engaged in hours of official work in addition to the hours of campaign work.

Biden also made a joke to the governors that didn’t go over well: “I’m fine — I don’t know about my brain, though.” Jen O’Malley Dillon, Biden’s campaign chairwoman, said the president was “clearly making a joke and then said, ‘All kidding aside.’”

Following Biden’s poor performance during CNN’s presidential debate last week, some Democrats have begun to call for the president to drop out of the race, leaving the White House scrambling to convince skeptics within the party and voters. In the days after, administration officials have provided confusing and conflicting explanations as they attempted to spin a performance that exacerbated voters’ concerns about Biden’s age.

Following the meeting, Govs. Wes Moore of Maryland, Kathy Hochul of New York and Tim Walz of Minnesota painted a positive picture of the meeting during a news conference, adding that Biden is “all in” and “in it to win it.”