Biden regrets dropping out of presidential race—says he would have won

President Joe Biden reportedly regrets his decision to exit the 2024 presidential race and believes he would have won re-election, despite widespread negative polling that suggested Donald Trump would defeat him in a rematch.

According to the Washington Post, Biden and his White House aides now believe he could have secured re-election against Trump, and they have conveyed this sentiment privately. Biden’s decision to drop out of the race was largely influenced by pressure from within his own party, which cited the unfavorable polling and growing concerns about his age and electability.

White House aides noted that Biden has been careful not to put blame on Vice President Kamala Harris or her campaign. This comes as many Democrats continue to feel as though Harris’ crushing defeat in the election was actually due to Biden delaying his withdrawal and not making room for a younger candidate sooner.

“Biden ran on the promise that he was going to be a transitional president, and in effect, have one term before handing it off to another generation,” said Senator Richard Blumenthal. “I think his running again broke that concept — the conceptual underpinning of the theory that he would end the Trump appeal, he would defeat Trumpism and enable a new era.”

Blumenthal, a supporter of Biden, acknowledged the president misjudged the nation’s political climate. He argued that Biden’s approach, shaped by decades in the Senate during an era of bipartisan compromise, may not have aligned with the polarized realities of modern politics.

“Even though people can be flexible and accommodate to new times, we are all a product of our growing-up years,” Blumenthal noted.

During his presidency, Biden faced a number of catastrophic failures ranging from economic instability to foreign policy setbacks, leading to criticism from both sides of the aisle. Despite this, the president’s advisors have been reluctant to put the blame on Biden himself and instead contend that his style of governance simply did not resonate with the American people.

“The president has been operating on a time horizon measured in decades, while the political cycle is measured in four years,” National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan argued. “How to govern at this moment to set the U.S. up for long-term success has one answer, and how to govern to deal with midterm and presidential elections in the very short-term might have a different answer.”