WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said Monday that New York governor Andrew Cuomo, whose popularity has surged thanks to his handling of the coronavirus outbreak in his city, would make a better candidate to run against him November's elections than Democratic frontrunner Joe Biden.
Cuomo, 62, is not in the running in the Democratic primaries, but his handling of the crisis in his city, the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States with some 60,000 reported cases, had seen his approval rating skyrocket from 41 percent in February to 71 percent.
"I'll be honest, I think he'd be a better candidate than Sleepy Joe, I wouldn't mind running against Andrew. I don't mind running against Joe Biden," the president told Fox News, using his derogatory nickname for Biden, the 77-year-old who served as vice president for Barack Obama.
But he also said that much of Cuomo's success in tackling the disease was due to the support given by the federal government.
"We've sent them a lot of stuff. Well, one of the reasons he's successful is because we've helped make him successful. Now if he's going to run that's fine," said Trump, himself a New Yorker who only recently changed his official residence to Florida.
"I've known Andrew for a long time, I wouldn't mind that."
"I personally don't think Joe Biden is capable" of handling the job of president during such a crisis," he said.
After a series of sweeping victories against his main rival Bernie Sanders, Biden is the clear frontrunner to be tapped as the Democratic nominee against Trump, but the pandemic's sudden arrival has thrown the entire primary process off kilter, with Biden making muted appearances from his home in Delaware.
By contrast, Cuomo has been leading the charge against the pandemic, making regular press conferences and appearing in public as he coordinates his city's battle against the virus.
The governor has been guarded in his criticism of the president's handling of the crisis, which Trump had initially brushed off as being like influenza.
But on Sunday he said scientists needed to convince the president that a "tsunami is coming."
"The science people, the government professionals have to stand up and look the president in the eye and say. 'This is not a political exercise, this is not press relations. It's not optics,'" Cuomo told MSNBC news.