When historians sift through the strangest Internet moments of the coronavirus pandemic, there will be images of professional wrestlers taunting each other in empty arenas, self-recorded videos of celebrities warning people to stay home — and Joe Biden’s “Illinois Virtual Town Hall.”
Filmed from his home state of Delaware, Biden appears in front of American and Illinois flags, pacing as he usually does before a room full of people. Except in this video, he is alone and holding a black cellphone to his mouth. Some scenes are garbled; in others he walks off screen.
“Am I on camera?” he asks once before later concluding, “I am sorry this has been such a disjointed effort here because of the connections.”
The coronavirus outbreak has brought the 2020 presidential campaign nearly to a halt, forcing Biden, 77, and the other two septuagenarians left in the race — Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, 78, and President Trump, 73 — to go digital as they avoid the large gatherings that public health officials warn will spread the virus and could endanger the candidates’ own health.
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