Trump claims 'Biden is incompetent while he's getting crowds to clap for drinking with one hand': reporter Yamiche Alcindor

PBS's Yamiche Alcindor joined MSNBC's Chris Hayes Monday evening, noting the strange way that President Donald Trump's campaign seems to be running several contrasting campaigns against former Vice President Joe Biden.

Trump has spent the better part of a year attacking the former VP as "Sleepy Joe Biden," claiming that he's mentally ill, senile and lacking the mental ability to be president. At the same time, however, Trump tried to generate a campaign where he calls Biden corrupt. It begs the question: how can someone be senile while leading some kind of nefarious corruption ring?

That isn't the only contrasting campaign coming out of the Trump campaign.

Washington Post columnist David Weigel took two screen captures from Trump ads that seem to conflict with each other. In these ads, Biden is both too tough and too weak on crime.

Then there's the issue of China. Trump has spent the better part of his presidency claiming to be friends with and a foe of China. So, it's no surprise that their latest plan is to turn from attacking Biden on all of the other things and go full-China.

"There is this comical inconsistency to the president," said Hayes. "Like, 'the virus is going away. Oh, it is actually the equivalent to World War II.' He's done this with Biden. When it comes to Joe Biden, these are two ads currently running by the Trump campaign about Joe Biden. One of them is, 'You won't be safe in Joe Biden's America' because he will get rid of the police. And the other is, 'We're going to do everything but hang people for jaywalking, about how the crime bill was too tough.

"That's right, the president is making the case he's a law and order president while saying he's not going to usher in the next wave of mass incarceration," said Alcindor. "So, I think there is a messaging issue there. I think also the big issue is that he's trying to make this message that Joe Biden is somehow incompetent and unable to do the job of the presidency while at the same time, he's getting crowds to clap for him because he can drink water with one hand. You see a president contrasting his messaging all over the place."

She called it a messaging problem that comes from Trump's constant swing from one thing to another every day. He's on message against Biden one moment and then ranting about the Washington football team changing its name.

"But the president obviously couldn't help himself," she continued. "He had to weigh in on this issue that is in some ways an unsettled issue. But the president can't resist. And as a result, you have the campaign and the White House having to circle the wagons, something they didn't want to have to focus on today."

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