12-28-2024, 10:10 PM
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/28/joe-biden-regrets-dropping-out-re-election wrote:Joe Biden regrets having pulled out of this year’s presidential race and believes he would have defeated Donald Trump in last month’s election – despite negative poll indications, White House sources have said.
The US president has reportedly also said he made a mistake in choosing Merrick Garland as attorney general – reflecting that Garland, a former US appeals court judge, was slow to prosecute Donald Trump for his role in the 6 January 2021 insurrection while presiding over a justice department that aggressively prosecuted Biden’s son Hunter.
With just more than three weeks of his single-term presidency remaining, Biden’s reported rueful reflections are revealed in a Washington Post profile that contains the clearest signs yet that he thinks he erred in withdrawing his candidacy in July after a woeful debate performance against his rival for the White House, Trump, the previous month.
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But according to the Post, Biden had to be persuaded by his chief of staff, Ron Klain, to choose Garland – at the time best known as Barack Obama’s failed choice to succeed the conservative justice Antonin Scalia on the US supreme court before his nomination was derailed by a Republican-led Senate.
Biden’s political allies had pressed the case for Doug Jones, then a Democratic senator for Alabama, arguing that he would be better equipped to navigate Washington’s bitterly partisan atmosphere. Klain, instead, argued that Garland, reputed for fairness, would send a more reassuring message of justice department independence after Trump.
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Biden now believes he should have chosen someone else, the Post reported, a view consistent with many Democrats, who believe Garland was too slow to investigate and eventually prosecute Trump for January 6 and related activities to reverse his defeat.
