According to an interview published on Sunday, President Biden said he has other things to finalize before starting a 2024 presidential campaign.
Biden told the media that his intention from the beginning was to run, but he must finish too many other things before he gets into a full-blown campaign.
Biden, 80, admitted in the same interview that people had a right to be worried about him running for president again because of his age. If Biden wins a second term in 2024, he’ll be 86 when he finally leaves office.
Biden has already stated that he will not formally announce his candidacy since doing so would violate federal election laws and limit campaign funding. In 2021, then-President Donald Trump made a statement along the same lines. A week after the midterm elections on November 8, 2016, Trump made history by declaring his candidacy for president as the first prominent Republican.
Biden’s public pronouncements have continued widespread conjecture regarding his future. Several Democratic fundraisers and strategists devised a backup plan after an article published this week quoted four individuals acquainted with the president’s thinking as saying there is no firm timeline for when Biden will announce his run.
In 2021, when Biden took office, he was the oldest person in history to hold the president’s office. Republicans and a few Democrats have expressed concern that he’s too old.
Nikki Haley, a Republican presidential candidate, stated earlier this month that candidates 75 and older should be required to pass a mental fitness test.
One of Haley’s campaign advisers, Nachama Soloveichik, made comments to the media earlier this week suggesting that it wouldn’t be unreasonable to require Bernie Sanders, who is 81 years old and chairs the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, to take a 10-minute test to determine whether or not he can draw a clock or identify an animal.
Biden has stated that he would discuss a possible run for president with his family over the Christmas break and that his health is a factor in his decision. Yet there has been no official word as of yet.
In 2024, many voters, even some fellow Democrats, will decide whether or not to give Biden a second term. The percentage of Democrats who think Biden should run again has dropped to 37% from 52% before the midterm elections last November. Only 22% of all adults in the United States felt he should seek reelection.
Conversely, among Republicans, President Trump still significantly impacts primary voters because of his position as a party leader. More candidates outside Trump and Haley are Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, Former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are also in the running.