Erin Schaff/The New York Times
For months, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. hewed to a tortoise-like strategy for the 2020 presidential race: Repeatedly delaying his final decision, he hoped to skirt a long stretch of campaigning as a front-runner with a target on his back.
That approach carried risks. Mr. Biden missed the chance to recruit top-level aides, including former Obama advisers, women and people of color, because he had not formalized his campaign. He left urgent questions about his political vulnerabilities lingering, and he has not deployed researchers to review his vast record, because he has not hired any.
Still, the former vice president persisted with his unrushed strategy — until this past week, when it appeared to backfire in striking fashion.
Mr. Biden has faced accusations from multiple women who came forward to complain that his penchant for close physical contact made them feel uneasy. Rival Democrats demanded that he account for his treatment of the women, and President Trump lobbed taunts that offered a preview of how he might attack Mr. Biden in a 2020 general election.
It was a multiday crisis that seemed entirely foreseeable, given that Mr. Biden’s physical touching occurred over many years, often in public. But despite almost five decades in the political arena, Mr. Biden, 76, did not have an agile, fully staffed campaign in place to confront it.
He issued three statements and one online video attempting to explain his conduct, only to joke about the issue in a speech to a union conference Friday. Afterward, he gave an ambivalent response to reporters who asked if he was sorry, acknowledging that he would have to change his behavior but apologizing only for the fact that he “didn’t understand more” about the implications of his conduct.
Mr. Biden showed no evident regret about his wait-and-wait-some-more strategy, explaining coyly that he would “give everybody else their day, then I get a shot.”
But Mr. Biden’s eventual announcement now seems fated to fall in the shadow of the recent allegations and the progressive concerns he has so far declined to address. Far from remaining above the fray, Mr. Biden will enter the campaign as bruised as any of the 16 other candidates already in the race.
“They’re in this never-never land right now,” said David Plouffe, the former strategist to President Barack Obama’s campaign, “because they’re being treated by the outside world like they’re in the race full speed and they’re not. That’s a really tough place to be.”
[Sign up for our politics newsletter and join the conversation around the 2020 presidential race.]Mr. Plouffe cautioned that Mr. Biden’s initial difficulties could all mean very little should the former vice president enjoy a successful start when he formally enters the race.
Indeed, amid the week’s chaos, Mr. Biden for the first time took several swift steps toward becoming a candidate: His allies have been told to expect an announcement after Easter and the former vice president was sighted on Thursday in Scranton, Pa., apparently recording a video at his childhood home there. And Mr. Biden has secured the services of Mark Putnam, a Democratic ad maker known for crafting gripping, cinematic commercials, according to people familiar with the decision. (Mr. Putnam declined to comment.)
Mr. Biden has used his time on the sideline to some advantage. Aides have put him through so-called murder board sessions on his vulnerabilities and compiled documents detailing his accomplishments and weaknesses. His likely campaign manager, Greg Schultz, has organized now-weekly conference calls with future staff members.
But if the attacks from Mr. Trump and his allies illustrated that Republicans are worried about facing Mr. Biden, the controversy this past week has also shined a light on the risks Democrats would be taking in nominating him — and not just because of his recent problems.
The uneven response to the women’s accusations capped a four-month stretch in which Mr. Biden has labored to expand his core group of older, mostly white advisers; failed to defuse the political equivalent of ticking time bombs relating to race and gender that await his entry in the race; and delayed a campaign that will have considerable ground to make up organizationally, financially and technologically.
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