U.S. President Joe Biden said on Monday he plans to run for re-election in 2024 but with a caveat.
“I plan on running … but we’re not prepared to announce it yet,” Biden said in an interview with NBC’s Today show before the White House’s annual Easter egg event.
Biden has said he intends to be the Democratic candidate in 2024 but has not made a formal announcement. Both Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris have said they will run together.
Top White House advisers are set to make final decisions on launching Biden’s re-election campaign, NBC News reported, citing several unidentified sources.
“The decision part is over, but he resents the pressure to have to announce what he’s already decided,” one source familiar with the matter told NBC.
Biden was already the oldest U.S. president in history when inaugurated in January 2021. At the end of a second presidential term, if realized, he would be 86 years old.
Biden was largely spared the rigours of a traditional campaign in 2020 when a pandemic was declared in March of that year due to COVID-19. He held a series of video addresses and town halls from his Delaware residence.
Biden defeated Donald Trump in the 2020 election, but the U.S. still continues to experience the aftereffects of the 45th president’s refusal to accept that election loss. The Justice Department, through a special counsel, is examining Trump’s role in trying to reverse Biden’s win in the election aftermath, while dozens of Americans were criminally charged as a result of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol protesting the transition from Biden to Trump.
Wants to ‘finish what he started’
Jill Biden, in an interview with The Associated Press in late February, indicated there was little suspense as to whether her husband would run again.
“How many times does he have to say it for you to believe it?” she said.
“He says he’s not done. He’s not finished what he’s started. And that’s what’s important.”
Biden’s approval ratings in polling have often been barely above Trump’s historically low levels, reflecting a polarized country and concerns about economic conditions, primarily inflation. But some historians and political scientists have given Biden credit for what he was able to accomplish legislatively in the first two years of his presidency.
With the Republicans gaining control of the House in the 2022┬аmidterms, that legislative pace is slowing, though Biden can still enact executive orders.
Biden has been credited for leading an international response to provide military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine after Russia invaded the country in February 2022, but the White House will face the challenge of maintaining public enthusiasm for the effort. Some Republicans in Congress have also questioned the amount of┬аsupport for Ukraine.
Meanwhile, tensions between the U.S. and Beijing have been high throughout the Biden presidency, with the latest friction emanating from the American decision in February to shoot down a Chinese satellite balloon, as well as a visit to California last week by the Taiwanese president. China claims the island as its own and accuses the U.S. of encouraging Taiwan’s independence.
Domestically, the administration faces challenges beyond the economy. Last year’s seismic ruling on abortion rights from the Supreme Court has seen several Republican-led states look to further limit reproductive rights, either by enacting laws to punish out-of-state travel for abortions┬аor by limiting access to abortion medication.
As well, the Biden White House announced earlier this year it would end the┬аCOVID-19 public health emergency next month. That is expected to lead to significant challenges at the southern border, where many migrants have been held back from accessing the asylum process due to the pandemic-related Title 42 health restrictions.
So far, long shot presidential bids by two Democrats have been announced to challenge Biden тАФ the author Marianne Williamson, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the COVID-19 vaccine skeptic and nephew of former president John F. Kennedy, who filed paperwork last week to run.
On the Republican side, Trump, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy have announced their candidacies.
