In his very first interview since handing his 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue housekeys to Donald Trump, the Old Man Winter of American politics, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. — a.k.a. “one of America’s most consequential presidents” — had an awful lot to say about America, Europe, democracy, and the future of humanity.
And if you strained really hard, you could almost hear him.
Often speaking in a shaky, muffled whisper, the ex-president met with BBC reporter Nick Robinson earlier today. The date coincided with the 80th anniversary of VE Day, but most of the conversation centered around Biden’s critique of the current president, Donald Trump.
Spoiler: Biden ain’t a fan.
You can watch the entire 25-minute interview below:
Less than a year ago, Biden was the sitting U.S. president and had every intent of running for another term. Watching this interview, the absurdity of his handling the rigors of the White House for another four years was painfully apparent: Biden couldn’t even make it through the first question without coughing and wheezing.
Even the reporter acknowledged as much, although he never said so to Biden’s face:
Today, Biden is still warm and charismatic, with the folksy charm that made him an election winner but he is a much slower, quieter and more hesitant version of the leader he was once. Meeting with him in person, I found it hard to imagine he could have served for another four years in the White House, taking him closer to the age of 90. [emphasis added]
Given his (many) years, one thing Biden has is perspective: As the reporter noted, Biden will almost certainly be the last U.S. president who was still alive during World War II. Perhaps as an elder statesman, he could be an honest oracle of bipartisan wisdom — admitting his mistakes and taking personal accountability — because, now that his own career is over, all that matters is the future of America.
Nah.
Biden was primarily concerned with score-settling and defending his own legacy. During the entire interview, he acknowledged ZERO mistakes. As Politico noted:
Former U.S. President Joe Biden defended his decision to drop out of the 2024 presidential election just a few months before the crucial November vote, claiming it wouldn’t have changed anything if he’d called it quits sooner.
“I don’t think it would’ve mattered,” he told BBC Radio 4 Today in an interview broadcast Wednesday, his first since leaving office, when asked if he should have ended his candidacy earlier.
And WHY did he wait so long before dropping out, giving Kamala Harris just 106 days to campaign?
My (naïve) assumption was that it probably had something to do with his disastrous debate performance against Donald Trump. It turns out that had nothing to do with it: Biden was just so gosh-durn awesome, he couldn’t bear to walk away.
Describing his administration as a “transition government,” his presidency was “so successful” that “it was hard to say, now I’m going to stop,” Biden said.
“Things moved so quickly that it made it difficult to walk away,” he said.
Boy, do I feel foolish.
How wonderful were the Biden years? Apparently, it was a Golden Age of prosperity:
“Let me tell you: when I left office, we had created more jobs than any president in the history of the United States in one term,” Biden said. “Our economy was roaring, we were moving in a direction where the stock market was way up, we were in a situation where we were expanding our influence around the world in a positive world, increasing trade, we regained control of what we invented … of the future of computer chips.”
It sounds like George H. W. Bush’s explanation for being a one-termer on “The Simpsons”:
And since I’d achieved all my goals as president in one term, there was no need for a second. The End.
Biden also bashed the current administration’s efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war that was launched during Biden’s one and only term. So far, over a million Russians and Ukrainians have been killed or injured.
Biden was especially critical of Trump’s treatment of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky:
In his first broadcast interview since leaving the White House in January, Biden took aim at Trump’s foreign policy record — and singled out the shouty confrontation in the White House which saw Ukraine’s president belittled by Trump and his Vice President JD Vance.
“I found it beneath America in the way that took place,” Biden told the BBC. “The way we talk about now that ‘this is the Gulf of America’, ‘maybe we’re going to have to take back Panama,’ ‘maybe we need to acquire Greenland’ … what the hell’s going on here?”
He added: “What president ever talks like that? That’s not who we are.”
The elderly ex-president insisted that Ukraine shouldn’t cede a single inch of territory to Russia, even if it leads to peace:
Biden described the Trump administration’s suggestion that Ukraine give up territory as part of a peace deal with Russia as “modern-day appeasement” – a reference to European allies that allowed Adolf Hitler to annex Czechoslovakia in the 1930s in an ill-fated attempt to prevent a continent-wide conflict.
“I just don’t understand how people think that if we allow a dictator, a thug, to decide he’s going to take significant portions of land that aren’t his, that that’s going to satisfy him. I don’t quite understand,” Biden said of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Biden also dismissed Trump’s first 100 days:
Asked about Trump claiming his first 100 days were historically great, Biden said, “I’ll let history judge that. I don’t see anything that was triumphant.”
Very respectfully, Mr. President, history will judge far more than Trump’s first 100 days.
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