Jesse Watters downplays Biden's chances of beating Trump in November: 'Do I look worried? Not yet'

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Trump to kick start campaign rallies as Biden surrogate says former VP doesn't need to campaign publicly

President Trump to restart campaign events this month; reaction on 'The Five.'

"The Five" co-host Jesse Watters said Wednesday that he's "not yet" worried about President Trump's general election chances against presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden because the president is running with "one hand tied behind his back" as the nation faces the coronavirus, a recession and racial unrest.

"Yeah, they've been hiding Biden in the basement and they looked at a rigged CNN poll and think they're doing OK," Watters said. "I'll be perfectly honest... you had a quarter where you had the Chinese virus, which was very deadly. You had racial riots, you had a snap recession. So it's been a challenging second quarter for this Republican president in an election year, especially when 95 percent of the media is negative."

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Over the weekend, former Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, a top Biden surrogate, told a videoconference meeting of Virginia Democrats that the former vice president should remain in his basement -- where he has famously campaigned remotely during the coronavirus pandemic -- and that Democratic officials are broadly "preferring" that Biden stay out of the limelight.

The "Watters' World" host said believes things will get "worse" for Biden as the country recovers from the pandemic.

"Eventually he is going to have to come out of his basement. He's going to have to give his little tiny speeches, it's very, very small events," Watters said. "He's going to have to give interviews without looking at his notes. He's going to have to start answering questions from a gaggle of media reporters. And we all know he's not the most talented guy.

"He was kind of the default pick in the primary. Everybody else just kind of lost. So they said, 'OK, we'll go with Joe,'" Watters added. "Not a good fund raiser, not a good debater, not that great of a campaigner."

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Watters also emphasized the importance of Trump's signature rallies, which are set to resume June 19 in Tulsa, Okla.

"These rallies are kind of like the lifeblood for the president to get the base energized," Watters said. "They can pull out all the data from all these people there. You know, you buy 50,000 MAGA masks, you strap them on, you do two hours in a deep red state. Things will get back to normal. And do I look worried? Not yet."