White House officials say Joe Biden regrets withdrawing from this year’s presidential race, trailing Donald Trump in last month’s election despite negative poll results. He said he believed he would have won.
The U.S. president also reportedly said he made a mistake in choosing Merrick Garland as attorney general, saying that Garland, a former U.S. Court of Appeals judge, was the first judge to serve as attorney general. However, it reflects the delay in prosecuting Donald Trump for his role in the January 6, 2021, riot. The department aggressively prosecuted Biden’s son Hunter.
With just over three weeks left in the single-term president’s term, a Washington Post profile of Biden’s reported regrets contains the clearest sign yet. He said he believes he made a mistake in withdrawing his candidacy in July after a disastrous debate performance against his rival. Last month for Trump in the White House.
The president has chosen to replace Kamala Harris as the party’s nominee after mounting pressure from Democrats, citing polling evidence that appears to show he will almost certainly pull away from President Trump in the election. He resigned so that he could take office. He was aiming for a historic return to the White House as the Republican candidate.
Harris’ rise to the top of the race generated enthusiasm and improved polling numbers, but ultimately resulted in a decisive electoral and popular vote loss.
The Washington Post reports that Biden and his aides are careful not to blame Harris, but believe the outcome would have been different if she had stood her ground.
That view is disputed by many Harris supporters, who accuse the president of waiting too long to withdraw, leaving the vice president with little time to mount an effective campaign.
They also say Biden’s determination to seek a second term violates his 2020 campaign promise to be a “transitional” figure who will take the torch after one term, after steering the country away from President Trump. Pointed out.
“Biden ran on the promise that he would become interim president, effectively serving one term and handing over the presidency to the next generation,” Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut told the newspaper.
“I think his candidacy broke that concept again. He broke the conceptual foundations of the theory that he was going to end Trump’s appeal, defeat Trumpism, and enable a new era.”
On January 6, 2021, Garland was sentenced to justice a day after a mob incited by President Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol, although ultimately failing to overturn Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election. Considering that he has announced his nomination for secretary general, the outgoing president’s concerns about Garland are painful.
At the time, Biden said Garland would restore the Justice Department’s “honor, integrity and independence” after years of politicization under the Trump administration.
“Your loyalty is not to me. It’s to the law, the Constitution, and the people of this country,” Biden told Garland at his official presentation.
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But according to the Post, Mr. Biden needed the persuasion of his chief of staff, Ron Klain, to choose Ms. Garland. At the time, it was best known as a mistake made by Barack Obama to replace conservative Justice Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court before the nomination was finalized. It was stalled by the Republican-led Senate.
Biden’s political allies are pushing the case against then-Alabama Democratic Sen. Doug Jones, arguing he is better suited to navigate Washington’s harsh partisan atmosphere. Ta. Klain instead argued that Garland, who has a reputation for impartiality, would send a more reassuring message of the Justice Department’s independence after Trump.
Amid the series of events, Biden still faces Trump’s false accusations of “weaponizing” the department amid a criminal investigation into the Jan. 6 mission and storage of classified White House documents. — even as Hunter Biden and the president himself were also investigating the latter. unlawfully retaining confidential documents;
The newspaper said Biden now believes he should have chosen someone else, saying the investigation into Garland came too late and ultimately led to President Donald Trump’s Jan. 6 bid to overturn Trump’s defeat. He said he agrees with many Democrats who believe it was too late to prosecute the U.S. and related activities.
The careful pace of the investigation that ultimately led to the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith ultimately allowed President Trump to avoid the spectacle of a politically toxic trial before this year’s election.
Last month, Smith formally filed to terminate two criminal cases against Trump, effectively ending them, citing Trump’s election victory.
