President Joe Biden, both reflective and defensive as he discussed his legacy, told USA TODAY he believes he could have won his reelection bid − but isn’t sure he would have had the vigor to complete four more years in the Oval Office.
“So far, so good,” he said. “But who knows what I’m going to be when I’m 86 years old?”
In an exit interview about policy, politics and family, the president also said he hasn’t decided whether to take one more momentous action before he leaves office in two weeks: preemptive pardons, something only three presidents have done before.
A fire crackled in the fireplace on a cold Sunday afternoon, a massive portrait of FDR hanging above the mantle. Sitting at the historic Resolute desk, his presidential hero in his line of sight, the 46th president seemed determined to define his own record in office, and he discussed what he might do in his final days.
Could he have won?
“It’s presumptuous to say that, but I think yes,” Biden said, adding he based that view on polling he had reviewed. He expressed no such confidence when asked whether he had the vigor to serve another four years in office, though. “I don’t know,” he replied.
In 2020, “when Trump was running again for reelection, I really thought I had the best chance of beating him. But I also wasn’t looking to be president when I was 85 years old, 86 years old. And so I did talk about passing the baton” to the next generation of Democratic leaders, a phrase many in his party took to mean he wasn’t likely to seek a second term.
“But I don’t know,” he said, returning to the question about whether he could have fulfilled the world’s hardest job for another four years. “Who the hell knows?”
