America’s oldest president, 78, recovered to salute at the top of the stairs before leaving to meet with leaders of the Asian American community after the massacre of the massage parlor.
The press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, told reporters at the White House pool that the president was “doing well” after the fall.
“It was very windy. I almost fell up the stairs. He’s doing 100 percent,” she told reporters. “He’s fine. He’s preparing for the trip very well.”
The triple drop occurs amid doubts about the suitability of the elderly president to the post, after referring to his vice president as “President Harris”.
Half of Americans “were not confident” that Biden was “physically and mentally up to the job”, with a third concerned that he had not yet given a press conference, according to a Rasmussen poll in March.
The White House has announced that Biden’s first press conference will be held on his 65th day in office, on March 25.
Biden’s fall on a windy morning at Andrews Joint Base comes after he suffered a fractured right foot playing with the Major dog in November, after which he was forced to wear a boot for weeks.
Presidential precariousness became a campaign problem during the 2020 election, after Donald Trump’s awkward walk down a small ramp at the West Point military academy.
Although he may have been relegated to a footnote to the electoral cycle, Mr. Trump spent several days defending the walk during campaign rallies and media interviews, saying Wall Street Newspaper the ramp was “like an ice skating rink”, slippery because of its leather-soled shoes.
He also said that the walk was taken out of context, with the footage cut off before he “ran across the rest” of the ramp.
“I was very handsome,” said Trump. “I took these small steps, so I ran down.”
Biden is not the first president to trip over the plane’s stairs. In 1975, President Gerald Ford fell from the stairs of Air Force One to Austria. Betty Ford, however, maintained her stance.