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full screen US President Joe Biden boards the presidential plane Air Force One to travel back to Washington DC after his covid isolation. Photo: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP/TT
Tonight Swedish time, US President Joe Biden breaks the silence about his decision not to run for re-election.
It has been three days since 81-year-old Joe Biden, in an open letter published on the platform X, dropped the bombshell that he is dropping out of the presidential election campaign. And at 2 o’clock tonight Swedish time, he gives a speech to the nation from the Oval Office in the White House.
The Democrat is expected to say more about what is behind the resignation and what he wants to do with his remaining time in the presidency, US media reports.
During a campaign rally the other day held by Vice President Kamala Harris, who is expected to take over as the party’s presidential nominee, Biden appeared on the link. There he made it clear that he intends to stay the entire term, despite speculation that he might leave the post prematurely:
– I’m not going anywhere, said Biden, and underlined that he wants to try to end the war in Gaza during his last six months in the White House.
Several American media, including the news channel PBS, interpret Biden’s statement as that he wants to achieve as much as possible in his remaining time in power and that he is thinking about his political legacy.
Since the decision to defect, however, Biden has been called a “lame duck” – the domestic term for someone who retains his title but lacks real power, which many politicians fear.
The defection came after criticism from his own camp in light of Biden’s disastrous performance in a debate against Republican Donald Trump at the end of June. During the debate, Biden gave a confused and weak impression, which caused heavy Democrats to urge him to drop out.
FACT Joe Biden
Joe Biden, born in 1942 in the mining town of Scranton in Pennsylvania, is the 46th president of the United States.
He was Barack Obama’s vice president between 2009 and 2017. Before that, he was Delaware’s senator for 36 years.
Biden is known as a cross-border centrist politician. Ahead of the 2020 presidential election, he emphasized his experience, his broad foreign policy knowledge and his working-class background.
He is married to Jill Biden and has two children in his life. Biden’s poignant family history is well known in the United States. His first wife died in 1972 in a car accident together with the couple’s one-year-old daughter. Biden, who was elected a senator a month earlier, then became a single father to sons Beau and Hunter – who were also injured in the accident. Beau Biden died of brain cancer in 2015. Together with Jill Biden, he has a daughter, Ashley Biden.
Joe Biden became the oldest president-elect in US history when he won the 2020 election against Donald Trump.
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