HOWARD KURTZ: Biden takes role as bystander on border, campus protests

The election might well be slipping away from Joe Biden.

And that’s the view among some who want the president to win a second term.

Biden’s passivity, and his reluctance to communicate, are fueling a narrative that he is a weak leader, and that’s now tied to a larger theme that will be difficult to shake by November.

For years, Biden’s refusal to take dramatic action – unilateral or otherwise – on the record-breaking illegal migration at what has become an open border, has been his greatest liability. It also happens to be Donald Trump’s strongest issue.

BIDEN’S LACK OF RESPONSE TO ANTI-ISRAEL PROTESTS GIVES SENSE AMERICA’S ‘OUT-OF-CONTROL’: HOWARD KURTZ

Then came the violent protests and antisemitic hatred that swept across college campuses like wildfire, and the president stubbornly remained silent for two long weeks. This has been the biggest and most alarming story in America, and Biden felt no need to address it as college buildings were being occupied and police were making mass arrests of pro-Hamas protesters.

The core concern here is that America feels out of control. The outbreak of lawlessness is heightened by a sense that no one is in charge. 

Despite the White House spin, Biden said nothing about the campus protests as a deputy spokesman put out releases under his own name. His two-sentence answer to a shouted question could barely be heard amid the background noise.

A Barack Obama adviser once told the New Yorker, fairly or unfairly, that Obama’s approach to Libya amounted to “leading from behind.” That seems to describe Biden’s approach to the violence and arrests at Columbia, NYU, Yale, Darthouth, USC, UCLA and many other colleges. His words were fine and well-crafted, but it felt like too little too late.

UNIVERSITIES CAVE TO ANTI-ISRAEL AGITATORS TO END OCCUPATIONS, WHILE SOME ALLOW ENCAMPMENTS TO CONTINUE

Now, it would be crazy to make predictions about an election six months away. Trump’s law-and-order stance is marred by his having to sit through the first of four criminal cases, the hush money trial. What’s more, the election will probably be decided by perhaps 50,000 voters in five swing states. 

Andrew Sullivan wants Biden to be re-elected, but doesn’t see it happening:

“Biden had an opportunity to move to the center on illegal immigration – his core vulnerability…