President Joe Biden tried hard to change his public perception during his interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, which aired as 30-minute special Friday night after having been taped earlier that day.

The commander-in-chief is in the midst of brutal press cycle after his dismal performance in the June 27 CNN debate against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.

That TV appearance was an opportunity he never should have taken.

The format did him no favors in the first place, and Biden’s mien made clear that even the moderators fact-checking in real time (as CNN’s Jake Tapper and Dana Bash did not do) would not have saved him. This second press appearance, a 22-minute interview that ABC aired without edits or interruption, was less an opportunity to clear the air than a necessary appointment — and a deferred one, at that, coming eight days after his soft-spoken, diffident, and confusing responses to an eminently fact-checkable Trump, dissembling and outright lying without a proper response, plunged his campaign into chaos.

Stephanopoulos asked a follow-up question: Biden said he was exhausted, and while Stephanopoulos allowed that the President had undergone a month of busy travel, he’d been back on east coast time for several days before the debate. Listening to this set of facts, Biden allowed his face to go into an expression familiar from the debate he was trying to erase from public memory. His eyes, on camera, looked into a distance unfamiliar; his mouth hung slackly open.

Biden said that he had undergone medical tests for “some infection — a virus” after his debate, but that he had just suffered “a really bad cold.” Asked if he watched the debate back, Biden said “I don’t think I did, no.” The qualifier said it all: He didn’t, in saying that he hadn’t watched it since experiencing it, seem certain.