Author: openjargon

• Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski broke down why it's important to promote internal talent.
• Siemiatkowski said raising younger employees to higher positions was the right choice.
• Companies have reduced promotions and high-salary hires, demoralizing younger workers.

While companies have been getting stingier with promotions in recent years, Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski's philosophy has been quite the opposite.

Siemiatkowski said on a podcast episode of "The Logan Bartlett Show" on June 28 that after cofounder Niklas Adalberth left the company in 2015, he wanted to create a new management team through internal promotions.

The buy now, pay later fintech was a decade old at that point, which allowed him to raise people into upper management positions despite cautionary warnings.

"Everyone had advised me, oh, these people are too young for that," he said. "You know, kind of typical startup advice, and it was the opposite. It was the right thing — these were proven individuals."

And many of them are still with Klarna.

Current CTO Yaron Shaer was promoted from senior engineering manager to director of engineering despite only being with the company for just under two years at that point. David Fock, who joined in 2010, became chief product and design officer after five years.

"There's a reason why, if you go to very traditional industry companies, like industrial companies or these things, they almost never hire senior executives from outside," Siemiatkowski said.

The CEO pointed to Volvo Trucks as an example. Siemiatkowski said they don't hire "some senior guy off the street" who does not have the understanding and familiarity of their products as an experienced employee does.

"You have to work there for 20 years," he said. "There's a reason for that."

While employees may like this sentiment of nurturing internal talent, employers have veered in the opposite direction in recent years.

Business Insider previously reported that, based on data compiled by Workday, businesses spanning all industries promoted fewer employees in 2023 compared to the previous year.

With high-salaried hiring in one of the biggest slumps of the past decade, companies have been able to be more frugal with fancy promotions, which can be especially demoralizing for the younger generation.

However, Siemiatkowski, who became a CEO at just 23, said that he thinks it's "critical" to allow younger employees to progress with the company.

Siemiatkowski said he's "willing to bet more even if they're junior and even if they're learning, but allow these people the same development and learning that I myself had."

• The Philippines wants to buy its first submarine as tensions in the region mount.
• Experts say their money would be better spent on drones and missile boats.
• There are powerful symbolic reasons for the Philippines to join the sub club.

Amid rising tensions with China, the Philippines is planning to buy its first submarine.

The Philippine government says this reflects a shift from internal counterinsurgency against rebels to external defense of the nation's sovereignty as China's military power grows in the South China Sea. But some experts question whether buying a sub makes sense given more cost-effective weapons to counter China, or whether it will even happen.

"There are a lot of folks inside and outside of the Philippine Navy saying, 'maybe this isn't the best use of our money," Greg Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, told Business Insider.

In February, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. announced that his nation would buy a submarine, as part of a long-term modernization of the Philippine armed forces. A Philippine Navy spokesman added that this reflected the Philippines shifting from internal to external defense. "We may not be a large navy … but we would have a navy that will take care of our territorial rights and sovereignty," he said.

China and its neighbors have been at loggerheads for the past decade, after Beijing claimed sovereignty over most of the South China Sea, including islands and resource-rich waters. Multiple nations — including Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines — reject those claims, as did an international tribunal in 2016.

In recent months, the Philippines and China have clashed over an unlikely prize: the Sierra Madre, a rusting ex-American amphibious landing ship from World War II, which the Philippine Navy grounded on the Second Thomas Shoal in 1999 to assert its rights over the area. China has tried to stop the Philippines military from resupplying the small garrison on the ship, including ramming Philippine ships, and using water cannon, lasers, and even axes and knives.

However, Poling doesn't believe that the sub acquisition is tied to this incident. Plans to buy a sub date back to the administration of former President Rodrigo Duterte, a populist whose attempts to embrace China sputtered. "The Philippines is in the last third of a 15-year military modernization plan to move from an internal counterterrorism-focused force to an external defense force," Poling said. "And that mainly means pumping more money into acquisitions for the navy and air force."

Though an American ally, it couldn't afford or operate the nuclear-powered models that the US builds. France, Spain, South Korea and Italy, which build diesel-electric subs, have expressed interest, the Philippine Navy has said. Diesel-electric submarines are relatively tough to detect before they surface to intake fresh air, and a small number of them could complicate China's efforts to encroach on atolls and islands by force.

But that leaves the question of how readily the Philippines Navy can operate a submarine. Its combat fleet mostly consists of small missile boats and patrol craft, plus two frigates and a corvette. Other Asian powers, including Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam, have subs. But Malaysia experienced major problems when it received French-built submarines in 2009.

Submarines are a "wildly expensive capability for any country to field because it is an entire ecosystem," said Poling. " You've got to build a submarine base. You've got to have trained crews."

The Philippines may not even have the money for a diesel submarine, which can cost $500 million apiece. "The key determinant here is the fiscal capacity of the Philippines," Mark Manantan, director of cybersecurity and critical technologies, at the Hawaii-based Pacific Forum think tank, told Business Insider. "According to some individuals within the defense and security establishment, purchasing a submarine will possibly eat up the entire defense budget."

Still, there are powerful symbolic reasons for the Philippines to join the sub club. It demonstrates success in ending a 50-year-old Communist insurgency, as well as a more recent rebellion by Islamic militants on the island of Mindanao.

"There are two complementary things going on here," said Poling. "One is the rise of China as a threat to the Philippines. The other is the pretty rapid advance of the peace process in the southern Philippines, along with the degradation of the Philippine Communist Party."

And as with many nations, there is a desire to keep up with the neighbors. "Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam have subs, so we should have subs, too," Poling said.

A single submarine would do little to change the power imbalance between the Philippines and China. Nor would it be useful against the sort of low-key, gray zone warfare that Beijing is waging in places, such as harassing the Philippine ship beached on the Second Thomas Shoal.

Rather than a $500 million diesel sub, a better option would be to acquire cheap but powerful weapons such as missiles, drones and small missile boats. Indeed, the Philippines recently took delivery of Indian-made BrahMos anti-ship missiles, with a range of around 180 miles.

"I don't think that you'll find any Philippine naval analysts who would stump for a submarine," Poling said. "They want BrahMos missiles or fast missile boats."

Ironically, one country that won't care about a new Philippine sub is China. "I don't think the purchase of submarines would have any deterrent effect at all," said Manantan, who believes China may also be counting on future Philippine governments to cancel the project. "The Chinese understand the volatility of Philippine domestic politics, particularly the in-fighting and rent-seeking dynamics among competing political parties. So Beijing is just biding its time up until a new administration sits that it can persuade or at least influence.

Ironically, one country that won't care about a new Philippine sub is China. Beijing is more concerned with alliances that Manila is pursuing, such as a new agreement that would allow the Japanese military — whose forebears committed atrocities against Filipinos during their WWII occupation — to use Philippine bases.

"This would be the first time since World War II that Japanese forces have been able to conduct live-fire training in an Asian nation," said Poling. "That worries China."

Michael Peck is a defense writer whose work has appeared in Forbes, Defense News, Foreign Policy magazine, and other publications. He holds an MA in political science from Rutgers Univ. Follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn.

• Daniel Pietschnig and Jessica Madalena thought they were emailing their real-estate agent.
• But it was really a scammer who had been sending the couple messages for weeks.
• The scammer convinced them to wire their $32,430 down payment to a fake bank account and vanished. 

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Daniel Pietschnig, 32, and Jessica Madalena, 31, who lost a $32,430 home down payment to a scammer in 2022. The essay has been edited for length and clarity.

Daniel: We live in Wood-Ridge, New Jersey. Compared to other major cities in the state like Jersey City and Newark, it is a smaller area.

Jessica grew up in Wood-Ridge; her mother and grandfather grew up here, too. Since her family is from the town, it was somewhere we wanted to start our lives together.

There's not a lot of availability here. Whenever a home goes on the market, it gets scooped up right away and for over the asking price.

When we found our house, we thought we were pretty lucky. It has a lot of potential and was almost move-in ready: three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and very well-kept.

We closed on the house in November 2022 and were under contract in September. That month, we were supposed to pay our down payment.

We had been saving up for a little under a year. Before Jessica and I lived together, I had my own home and sold it, making a little bit of profit from the sale. I used a combination of that money, along with what we had been saving, for the down payment.

Jessica: It all happened in about 10 days. On September 9, we wired $32,430 to who we thought was the home seller's attorney. We didn't realize until our actual down payment due date of September 19 that we had been scammed.

They seemed to hack our real-estate agent's email

Daniel: The scam happened over the course of a couple of weeks. It was surreal.

We had been working with a real-estate agent who was a family friend of Jessica's. Her parents had used her for a couple of transactions, so she was trusted.

Somehow a hacker got into her email account, and then was able to get all of our transaction information.

Through email, they made up a fake story and convinced Jessica and me to send our down payment to the bank account of the "seller's attorney" instead of dropping it off at the real attorney's office.

I thought it was a little bit weird, but I didn't really think much of it. We thought we were talking to our attorney, the seller's attorney, and our real-estate agent.

For a few weeks, we thought everything was okay. But we got a call from our real attorney, and they said, "Hey, your down payment is due today." I was like, "What are you talking about? We sent it two weeks ago."

I called the seller's attorney, and he explained that the email account was not his, and the bank account wasn't either. I was in shock and my heart dropped.

It turns out, the scammer spoofed our attorney's email address by changing one or two of the letters to make it seem real. They even took a signature from a previous email he had sent us to make his look like they were legitimately from him.

We found out the only real email address in the thread was our real-estate agent's, but she wasn't the one communicating with us. She told us via text message that her email account must have been hacked — that it was her email address, but she didn't write it.

Editor's note: The real-estate agent referred BI to the owner of her brokerage for comment. He said that he has "no firm evidence we were hacked," that wire fraud is an issue for everyone in the real-estate industry, and that this is the only instance he can recall where scammers succeeded in taking money from homebuyers.

We'll never recover our lost money

Daniel: After discovering the scam, the first person I called was Jessica.

It was me who had sent the money, and I felt like I let everyone down. I was overwhelmed with guilt because I didn't know if we could still get the house.

Jessica: When I found out, I was so emotional, I just started bawling. I felt like everything we had worked for had been ripped away from us. I also felt violated, thinking about what else they could do with our Social Security and bank account information.

Daniel: After talking to Jessica, I called my bank to explain what happened. They said they would try to contact the bank where the money was deposited, but there's no guarantee that after two weeks they'd be able to recover any of our money.

We contacted the FBI, who told us to speak with our local prosecutor's office. I reached out to them and they suggested filing a police report.

A detective who investigated our case told us that our money was transferred to an overseas account and turned into Bitcoin.

At this point, we're realistic that we probably won't recover any of our money.

Homebuyers should be more aware of real-estate scams

Daniel: Throughout this ordeal, we learned that scammers often succeed by creating a sense of urgency. They also tend to strike on Fridays, knowing that financial institutions close for the weekend. By the time banks open on Mondays, your money is already gone.

From my experience, I would advise that if you receive an email or text that seems to be from your agent, attorney, mortgage company, or anyone involved in the transaction, always verify by calling them. That's where you could save a lot of headache and heartbreak.

Of course, what happened to us is not my favorite thing to think about, but the more we talk about it, the more we can raise awareness about these types of scams.

One of the first things I told Jessica when the scam happened was, 'No matter what, we're getting this home. This is where we start our lives.'

In the end, we do consider ourselves winners because we did exactly that.

The home was listed for $562,900, and we paid $540,000 for it. We were fortunate to receive help from our family for the down payment. They gave us $25,000, and we paid the remainder of the $32,430 down payment from our savings.

Despite what happened, it truly does feel like our home.

Jessica is a talented interior designer, and together we've made subtle cosmetic improvements. Her stepdad was here almost every day helping us paint, and my dad assisted with the electrical work. It was a real team effort with our family.

Right now, we're focused on moving forward and celebrating — we're even getting married in August.

• Jennison Grigsby, an American mom and yoga teacher, moved to Spain nine years ag.
• She is raising her bicultural son, Luca, with her Spanish husband.
• Grigsby values Spain's affordable and diverse summer camps and the strong community.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jennison Grigsby, an American mom and yoga teacher who lives in Valencia, Spain. It's been edited for length and clarity.

I've been living in Spain for nine and a half years. I met my husband about 11 years ago when I was taking a little sabbatical from life. We decided to move to Valencia temporarily, thinking we would return to the US after a couple of years, but we ended up loving it so much that we decided to stay.

My husband is from Valencia, so we have his family here. We're well-connected in the local and expat communities, making us feel at home.

We have an almost 9-year-old son named Luca. Although he's half-American, he's very Spanish. He's lived in Spain his entire life and really connects with the culture. All his friends are Spanish, and he spends a lot of time with his Spanish side of the family, who help us out a lot.

We go back to the US as a family at least once a year, usually during summer break, and every other year, we also go for Christmas. We're heading to California soon for a couple of weeks.

When we return from the States, Luca will attend two different summer camps. The first is with the Valencia Football Club (soccer), where he trains for a week but comes home every night. Then, once that's done, he'll attend an indoor soccer camp.

I love that most schools in Spain offer affordable on-site summer camps

Compared to the US, I found that most schools in Spain offer on-site summer camps at a low cost, focusing on sports and art activities. In the US, summer school is more academic, often used to catch up on subjects or get ahead for the next year. Then there are summer camps, which typically last a week but can be expensive.

In Spain, summer camp options include on-site school camps with sports and arts, sleepaway camps, or day camps without overnight stays. Kids start going to sleepaway camps in the summer for one to two weeks when they're a bit older, usually around 10 to 12. Some parents find it exciting that their kids can go off on their own for a bit. The challenging part is that there are usually no camps in August, so we have a full month with fewer options. That's when most families choose to travel.

I find it quite nice that there are many different options for summer camp hours in Spain. Camps usually start at 9 a.m. and you can choose to have your child stay until 1 p.m., 3 p.m., or 5 p.m. The regular school schedule in June and September is also modified due to the heat, offering the same options. As a parent, you can decide the time you want your child to finish, and you pay for the extra hours, which include childcare, lunch, and activities.

Kids are separated by age at school, and have little overlap

My husband and I had our eye on a well-known Catholic school even though we're not religious because it's a big traditional Spanish school, and we wanted Luca to be exposed to more people, more sports, and more activities. It might be overwhelming for some children, but I love its strong community feel. The school has around 90 students per grade, divided into three classes of 30, and it accommodates kids from ages 3 to 18.

I like that different age groups are kept separate to minimize interactions and ensure younger kids aren't negatively influenced by older students. All the students are at school together; they see each other at some of the community events, but they're still able to stay in their age group. For example, the "infantil" students (ages 3 to 5) have their own entrance and exit, and primary school kids are kept together as a group so they don't cross paths with the older children. I find this careful organization creates a safe environment for younger kids, reducing the chances of bullying.

My son learns the local dialect at school

The school system we chose is called "concertado," a middle ground between public and private schools that are more like religious charter schools in the US, where families pay something. One reason we were attracted to these was its balanced language instruction. In public schools, around 70 to 80% of subjects have traditionally been taught in Valenciano, while kids speak Spanish on the playground and have English classes. In concertado schools, only about 25% of classes are in Valenciano, such as social studies and religion.

For families with no background in Valenciano, public schools can be challenging since it's hard to help their children with schoolwork in a language they don't know. Fortunately, my husband could help Luca with Valenciano.

For us, 95% of Luca's life is in Spanish. He speaks English only with me or when talking to my parents and other family members on FaceTime. At home, my husband and I speak English so that Luca can hear adult conversations in English, and most of his TV is in English. As a baby, his first language was English since I was home with him for the first three years. Once he started school, Spanish became dominant, but I constantly remind him to speak to me in English to help him practice and maintain his bilingual skills, and also so we can connect on a deeper level.

• Ed Sheeran branded the entirety of London as "sketchy."
• Sheeran made the comments in an episode of "This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von."
• Sheeran reportedly owns more than 20 properties in London.

Ed Sheeran branded the entirety of London as "sketchy" in a recent episode of Theo Von's "This Past Weekend" podcast — despite the pop star reportedly owning more than 20 properties in the UK capital.

Asked about the most dangerous part of the UK, Sheeran, 33, said: "Here? I'd say every area of London. Literally, every area is sketchy."

"The nice areas are sketchy, the bad areas are sketchy. But you just have to not do stupid shit," he told Von. "If you wander around with, I dunno, like a Louis Vuitton duffel bag and a 200 grand watch, you are going to get robbed."

"But just don't do that," he added.

According to the website crimerate.co.uk, the crime rate in London over a 12 month-period ending April 2024 was 106 crimes per 1,000 people.

The site says that Hackney in east London is the city's most dangerous borough based on Crime Risk Scores, which it says are calculated by taking the severity of crimes into account, while the safest borough is Richmond upon Thames in the southwest of the capital.

Sheeran's apparent reserves about London's safety haven't stopped the singer from investing in the city, however.

The MailOnline reported in 2022 that the Grammy-award-winning artist had built up a portfolio of 22 properties in London, including two spots in Covent Garden in the city's West End.

Nevertheless, Sheeran spends most of his time residing on a 16-acre estate in Suffolk, in the east of England.

The lavish estate reportedly has a barn that Sheeran renovated into a private pub, as well as its own chapel — where the singer even added a crypt.

A representative for Sheeran did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

While Sheeran is now one of the biggest names in music, he started out as a struggling artist who spent some nights sleeping rough in London as he attempted to make it big.

Writing about the early days of his career in his 2014 autobiography, "Ed Sheeran: A Visual Journey," Sheeran recalled: "There was an arch outside Buckingham Palace that has a heating duct and I spent a couple of nights there. That's where I wrote the song 'Homeless' and the lines 'It's not a homeless night for me, I'm just home less than I'd like to be.'"

Per the book, it was while performing at a local homeless shelter that Sheeran met a sex worker and drug addict named Angel, who inspired his debut 2011 single "The A Team."

The song catapulted Sheeran into the limelight, and he has since gone on to amass a fortune of around £300 million (roughly $384 million), according to the Sunday Times Rich List 2023.

• President Joe Biden indicated he would be fine losing to Trump as long as he put up a good fight.
• The 81-year-old president made the comments during his first post-debate interview on Friday.
• Biden continues to present a defiant front even as concerns about his candidacy mount.

President Joe Biden suggested he would be OK losing to former President Donald Trump in November "as long as I gave it my all" — undercutting the heart of his 2024 presidential platform as concerns about his candidacy continue to grow.

On Friday, the 81-year-old Biden sat for his first interview since his disastrous debate performance last week, speaking with ABC News's George Stephanopoulos and attempting to assuage doubts about his fitness for office, including increasing anxiety from within his own party.

Biden has long positioned himself as the best bet to protect American democracy from another four years of Trump. In interviews and stump speeches, Biden paints a picture of chaos and collapse should Trump take the White House again. Biden's campaign has explicitly accused Trump of being in the race only for himself, meanwhile framing Biden as being a candidate for the people.

But near the end of his Friday interview, Biden gave an answer that seemed to contradict his greater-good narrative.

"If you stay in and Trump is elected and everything you're warning about comes to pass, how will you feel in January?" Stephanopoulos asked.

"I'll feel as long as I gave it my all, and I did as good a job as I know I can do, that's what this is about," Biden responded.

The response appeared as definitive an insight as any into Biden's stubborn mindset amid mounting calls for him to drop out of the race.

Four House Democrats and a growing number of liberal donors have publicly called for Biden's replacement. While some reports have suggested Biden is privately weighing whether he can save his reelection bid, he has been firm in his public promise to stay in the race.

Denial proved a prevailing theme throughout Biden's interview with ABC. He chalked up his debate performance to "a bad night," repeatedly dodged questions about his age and cognitive abilities, and disputed poll numbers that show him points behind Trump.

When asked what it would take for him to drop out of the race, Biden attempted to duck the question with a joke, telling Stephanopoulos that he would only step down if "the Lord Almighty" himself came down and told him he couldn't win.

• President Joe Biden sat down for an interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos.
• He acknowledged that his debate against Donald Trump was a "bad night."
• But Biden denied he's facing more calls to step down from his campaign.

President Joe Biden appears to be in denial with just how seriously his recent debate performance against Donald Trump has hurt his 2024 campaign.

In an interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos that aired Friday, Biden was confronted with questions about the fallout of his stumbling debate performance: polling that shows Trump with an increasing lead, voters and Democratic colleagues calling for Biden to step aside, and, to top it all off, an already abysmal approval rating of 36%.

To that, Biden responded: Not in my world.

On the issue of falling support shown in recent polls, Biden questioned the accuracy of the data and leaned on internal polling that he claimed still put the 2024 election at a "toss-up."

"You think polling data is accurate as it used to be?" Biden said.

The president also disagreed when Stephanopoulos pointed out his low approval rating. "Mr. President, I've never seen a president of 36% approval get re-elected," Stephanopoulos said.

"Well, I don't believe that's my approval rating — that's not what our polls show," Biden responded.

On the growing calls from Democratic lawmakers for the president to step down, Biden said he's met with many colleagues and none of them have advised him to suspend his campaign.

"They're not going to do that," Biden told Stephanopoulos when asked if he would consider stepping out of the race if people close to him asked him to do so. So far, four House Democrats have called for Biden to drop out, and one Democratic senator is reportedly trying to organize his colleagues to push for Biden to withdraw from the race.

Biden repeatedly said in the interview that the only person who could get him to step down is the "Lord almighty."

All of the warning signs that have appeared since the June 27 debate were merely propped up by the press, Biden said.

A spokesperson for the Biden campaign told Business Insider that the president's interview with Stephanopoulos was just one of many moments that showcased that Biden is the right candidate to go against Trump.

Biden did acknowledge that he didn't perform well during his debate against Trump.

But the president said the evening was simply a "bad night" for him and that he failed to "trust his instincts" when debating a against a "pathological liar."

"Can I run the 100 in 10 flat? No," Biden said. "But I'm still in good shape."

• President Joe Biden said only God might convince him to drop out of the 2024 race.
• Biden made frequent defiant statements during a hotly anticipated interview with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos.
• The president is still trying to calm nerves after his disastrous debate performance.

President Joe Biden on Friday was unmoved by the growing number of members of Congress and megadonors who have called on him to drop out. He said only a higher power could cause him to change course.

"If the Lord Almighty comes down and tells me that, I might do that," Biden told ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos when asked if he would step aside if he was no longer the best Democrat to beat former President Donald Trump.

Biden flashed his trademark stubbornness during his 22-minute interview with Stephanopoulos. The interview was designed to calm jittery Democrats, some of whom have pushed for Biden to step aside after his disastrous debate last week.

The president is known for invoking the phrase, "Judge me by the alternative, not the almighty," regarding how commentators should view his candidacy. But on Friday, Biden further suggested that only divine intervention could lead to him stepping aside.

"Look, I'm mean if the Lord Almighty came down and said, 'Joe get out of the race,' I would get out of the race," Biden said at another point. "The Lord Almighty is not coming down."

At that point, Stephanopoulos was trying to ask Biden how the president would respond if either Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer or House Minority Leader Hakeem called on the president to drop out. Biden was clear that he believed that would never happen and that the hypothetical was unwarranted.

"I agree that the Lord Almighty is not going to come down," Stephanopoulos said. "But if you are told reliably from your allies, from your friends and allies in the Democratic Party in the House and the Senate that they are concerned that you are going to lose the House and Senate if you stay in, what will you do?"

Biden faced with a much more earthly consideration, simply declined to consider the possibility.

"I'm not going to answer that question," he said. "It's not going to happen."

• President Joe Biden appeared Friday in his first interview since last week's debate with Donald Trump.
• Donors and supporters saw the interview as key to addressing criticisms of Biden's poor debate.
• Here's four things you need to know about it went.

All eyes were on ABC News on Friday when President Joe Biden appeared in his first interview since his catastrophic debate appearance last week.

Democratic donors and supporters of Biden saw the interview as key to addressing criticisms of his poor debate showing — in which Biden repeatedly fumbled his words and appeared to lose his train of thought.

Here's what you need to know about how Biden's post-debate interview went:

1. He's staying in the race

In response to the debate debacle, some major Democratic donors, including Netflix cofounder Reed Hastings and Disney heiress Abigail Disney, have pledged to withhold funding from the party until Biden drops out of the race.

Other once-loyal supporters, including four sitting House Democrats, have joined their calls for him to step aside.

While some reports indicate Biden has privately acknowledged that he might be unable to save his reelection bid, in his ABC News interview, he publicly reiterated his current plan to stay in the race.

"Are you sure you're being honest with yourself when you say you have the mental and physical capacity to serve another four years?" ABC's George Stephanopoulos pushed Biden.

"Yes, I am," the president responded. "Because George, last thing I want to do is not be able to meet that."

2. Biden called debate night a 'bad episode'

Biden called his poor showing on debate night a "bad episode," but he stressed his fumbled words and mangled answers were "no indication of any serious condition."

"I was exhausted," Biden told ABC News. "I didn't listen to my instincts in terms of preparing and — and a bad night."

Biden, currently 81-years-old, has long faced criticism over his age and fitness for office, which grew louder following the debate. His campaign has offered conflicting excuses for the sitting president's lackluster showing, including that he was sick, jetlagged, and poorly prepared for the event.

When Stephanopoulos pressed Biden, asking why spending nearly a week at Camp David wasn't enough recovery time from his travels to France to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day, Biden said he was sick.

"I was feeling terrible," Biden said. "Matter of fact the docs with me. I asked if they did a COVID test because they're trying to figure out what was wrong. They did a test to see whether or not I had some infection, you know, a virus. I didn't. I just had a really bad cold."

3. The president seems to be considering his legacy

While he maintained that he plans to stay in the race for reelection — joking that he'd consider stepping down if "the Lord Almighty" asked him to — Biden, in several responses, appeared reflective about his debate performance and his presidential legacy more broadly.

"If I stopped now, I would go down in history as a pretty successful president," Biden said.

And if Trump wins?

Biden said that "as long as I gave it my all," he will be OK.

"That's what this is about," Biden said.

Notably, Biden dodged questions about what he would do if Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jefferies asked him to step down.

4. Biden glossed over his dipping poll numbers

When pressed about his persistent slump in the polls, Biden was defiant, saying the data wasn't accurate.

"I remember them telling me the same thing in 2020 — I can't win. The polls show I can win," Biden said. "Before the vote, I said that's not going to happen: We're going to win."

When he won in 2020, Biden became the first US presidential candidate to secure more than 80 million votes. Biden referenced his historic victory in the interview, reiterating his intention to win again.

Stephanopoulos asked if Biden had seen recent reports of discontent in the Democratic party, which Biden similarly brushed off.

"I've seen it from the press," Biden said.

5. Viewers don't so far appear to be convinced

On social media, clips of the 22-minute interview drew immediate skepticism, if not outright condemnation, from many viewers.

Some lambasted ABC News for airing a pre-recorded version instead of a livestream, while others criticized Biden's responses and appearance during the interview.

"I feel no better," one Instagram user wrote in a comment. "I think this interview made the situation worse."

The initial response wasn't all negative, with some reiterating their support for Biden.

"I can appreciate that he's accepted responsibility," another Instagram user wrote. "He still has my vote. There's no room for any more errors IMO."

• Democratic members of Congress are beginning to call on Biden to drop out of the race.
• As of Friday, July 5, four have done so.
• Two other lawmakers are flatly predicting that Biden will lose to Trump.

President Joe Biden is facing calls to drop out of the presidential race following his disastrous debate performance last week.

The first Democratic member of Congress to do so was Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas, who praised Biden's record of accomplishments but said an "authoritarian takeover" would come if former President Donald Trump won.

"Too much is at stake to risk a Trump victory — too great a risk to assume that what could not be turned around in a year, what was not turned around in the debate, can be turned around now," Doggett said. He later said on NBC that some of his House colleagues privately agreed with him.

On Wednesday, Doggett was joined by Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Arizona, who told the New York Times that the debate represented an "opportunity to look elsewhere."

"What he needs to do is shoulder the responsibility for keeping that seat — and part of that responsibility is to get out of this race," said Grijalva.

Both men are in their mid-to-late 70s and represent solidly Democratic seats.

On Thursday, Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts joined them, telling a local radio affiliate that Biden should "step aside to let new leaders rise up and run against Donald Trump."

And on Friday, shortly before Biden's interview with ABC News was set to air, Rep. Mike Quigley of Illinois said on MSBNC that Biden should "let someone else do this."

Separately, two members of the moderate Blue Dog Coalition — Reps. Jared Golden of Maine and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington — said that they believe Biden will lose to Trump.

Golden went as far as to say that he is "OK" with Trump winning, saying he rejects the idea that Trump is a "unique threat to our democracy."

Democratic politicians who don't hold elected office have also called on Biden to step aside.

Former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro, one of Biden's competitors in 2020, said that Biden needed to "allow a stronger Democratic candidate to prevent a disastrous second Trump term.

Another 2020 Biden competitor, former Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio, published an op-ed on Tuesday calling for Biden to be replaced with Vice President Kamala Harris.

Harris is one of several Democratic contenders who could replace Biden if he stepped aside.