President Joe Biden commented on his political future on Thursday and made it sound like he will be running again in 2024. Furthermore, he...
President Joe Biden commented on his political future on Thursday and made it sound like he will be running again in 2024. Furthermore, he indicated he’s confident he could defeat former President Donald Trump if they were to face off again.
During a news conference in Brussels, where Biden was meeting with European leaders to discuss Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a foreign journalist asked Biden about concerns among U.S. allies that Trump could return to the White House.
“There are widespread concerns in Europe that a figure like your predecessor, maybe even your predecessor himself, might get elected president again,” Markus Becker of Germany’s Der Spiegel said. “So, are there any steps, anything you’re trying to do and NATO is trying to do here, these days, to prevent what you’re trying to do becoming undone two years from now?”
Biden responded by saying he decided to run against Trump in 2020 because of the Republican’s comments about the violent 2017 protests in Charlottesville, Virginia. As he has done on several occasions, he misrepresented what Trump said when referring to “very fine people on both sides,” leaving out the part where the then-president said, “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists — because they should be condemned totally.”
“That’s when I decided I wasn’t going to be quiet any longer,” Biden said. He said he “made a determination: Nothing is worth — no election is worth my not doing exactly what I think is the right thing.”
Noting that “we’re a long way off in elections — a long way off,” the president said he would welcome a rematch with Trump in 2024.
“In the next election, I’d be very fortunate if I had that same man running against me,” Biden said.
While Trump has not announced his candidacy for 2024, he has made numerous comments hinting at another presidential run.
At the Conservative Political Action Conference in February, the former president talked about doing “it again,” the New York Post reported.
“We did it twice, and we’ll do it again,” he said. “We’re going to be doing it again, a third time.”
Biden, however, expressed confidence in his ability to win against Trump in two years.
“One of the things that I take some solace from is I don’t think you’ll find any European leader who thinks that I am not up to the job. And I mean that sincerely,” he said Thursday.
When Russia invaded Ukraine, Trump criticized Biden and called it “an atrocity that should have never been allowed to occur,” CBS News reported.
“This never would have happened with us. Had I been in office, not even thinkable. This would never have happened,” the former president in a Feb. 22 interview.
Biden’s bold talk about a rematch with Trump is in line with previous comments about a possible 2024 faceoff.
In December, the president told ABC News that he planned to run again and he wasn’t afraid of facing Trump.
“Sure. Why would I not run against Donald Trump? He’s the nominee, that increases the prospect of running,” Biden said.
However, Biden’s approval rating fell to a new low this week, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found.
According to the survey, only 40 percent of Americans approve of the president’s job performance compared with 54 percent who disapprove.
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