President Joe Biden kinda, maybe made a 2024 re-election announcement
President Joe Biden kinda, maybe made a 2024 re-election announcement despite Donald Trump attacks, inflation and other woes.
When President Bill Clinton and his political team prepared for his 1996 re-election bid, Clinton didn’t bother to hold an official campaign kickoff event. The Clinton-Gore re-election team instead simply opened its campaign headquarters in April 1995. So obvious was the fact that the president would be seeking a second term that he just steamed straight into the campaign.
Though most modern presidents have officially announced re-election runs, they have done so mostly to gin up excitement and attract extra media attention. They haven’t done so to lay to rest questions about their political plans, because those were taken for granted. And whether they have formally announced or not, they have certainly not hemmed and hawed about their intentions, then leaked through thirdhand sources that they will be going for it.
The very fact that a Biden 2024 White House bid is publicly in question reflects the set of deep political challenges he faces compared to other first-term presidents.
Yet that’s what Biden has done. Two weeks ago in a “60 Minutes” interview on CBS, he alluded to making a final decision about running after the Nov. 8 midterm elections. Then, on Monday, NBC News reported that the president recently told the Rev. Al Sharpton in a private conversation at the White House that he will seek a second term. Sharpton, who is also an MSNBC host, informed his staff at the National Action Network, one of whose officials spoke to NBC News.
The very fact that a Biden 2024 White House bid is publicly in question reflects the deep political challenges he faces compared to other first-term presidents, as well as his personal circumstances as the oldest U.S. president in history. When Biden launched his presidential bid in 2019, his campaign team presented the former vice president and 36-year Delaware senator, now 79, as a “transition figure” who could beat Donald Trump and then pass the leadership mantle to another Democrat.
Rating: 5