For Joe Biden, a career defined by proving the doubters wrong faces its biggest test

President Joe Biden’s dug-in stance that he is staying in the race in the wake of the first presidential debate is not too surprising to those who know him well.

Joe Biden is betting on himself. In the president’s telling, the pundits have always doubted him. The Washington class has always scoffed at his approach. He was never the darling of Democratic donors. The polls that show moribund approval ratings and widespread unease with his age don’t capture his true standing. The defiance Biden has thrust into public view at the start of a critical week is a feature, not a bug. “I’m getting frustrated by the elites in the party, ‘Oh, they know so much more,’” he said in a surprise call-in interview Monday on MSNBC. “Any of these guys that don’t think I should run, run against me. Announce for president. Challenge me at the convention.” Biden’s public comments, which echoed a Monday morning letter to Democratic lawmakers, revealed flashes of what animates the president and his team, now staring down a moment of peak political peril. His closest advisers have long carried a similar boulder-size chip on their shoulders, with ready examples of their boss being doubted, dismissed or derided over the years. If Biden’s life has been defined by resilience in the face of immense personal tragedy, the consistent element of his hardly linear path to the Oval Office has been a relentless belief that at its core – whether on politics, policy or legislating – his approach will work.