Fmr Biden Chief of Staff: Focus on Economy

(Getty)

Ron Klain, a former White House chief of staff under President Joe Biden, said his former boss is focused too much on infrastructure — including bridges — during his reelection campaign and not enough on the economy.

“I think the president is out there too much talking about bridges,” Klain said Tuesday night at an event hosted by the publication “Democracy: A Journal of Ideas,” according to audio obtained by Politico.

“He does two or three events a week where he’s cutting a ribbon on a bridge,” Klain said. “And here’s a bridge. Like, I tell you, if you go into the grocery store, you go to the grocery store and, you know, eggs and milk are expensive. The fact that there’s a [expletive] bridge is not [inaudible].”

Klain, who was chief of staff for two vice presidents — Al Gore and Biden — and a senior adviser to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, said Biden would fare better with voters by focusing on his economic message and proposals.

“He’s not a congressman. He’s not running for Congress,” Klain said. “I think it’s kind of a fool’s errand. I think that [it] also doesn’t get covered that much because, look, it’s a [expletive] bridge. Like, it’s a bridge; and how interesting is the bridge? It’s a little interesting, but it’s not a lot interesting.”

Klain’s comments come after Biden recently responded to the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore by pledging $60 million in federal funds to help the repair effort. Last week, Biden visited the area where the bridge collapsed after a cargo ship floated into one of its supports.

White House spokesman Andrew Bates told Politico there is no daylight between what Biden is doing and what Klain is suggesting.

“Like Ron says, President Biden is crisscrossing the country building on his State of the Union message, highlighting that he is fighting to grow the middle class and lower costs like prescription drugs while blocking the trickle-down agenda Republican officials have proposed on behalf of rich special interests, including Medicare cuts and tax giveaways to big corporations,” Bates said. “The president repeated that message in his Univision interview [Tuesday] and will not let up.”