US President Joe Biden told Democratic donors on Tuesday he wasn’t confident he’d be seeking another term if his predecessor, Donald Trump, wasn’t himself running for the White House.
“If Trump wasn’t running, I’m not sure I’d be running,” he said, according to CNN, adding that Democrats “cannot let [Trump] win.”
The comment, made during a fundraiser at a private home outside Boston, offered perhaps the starkest rationale to date for Biden’s reelection decision-making. The remark suggested Biden may not have sought a second term if Trump had not decided to run again.
Biden has long viewed himself as the best shot at protecting the country from another Trump administration, and has framed the upcoming election as a defense of Democracy.
Trump officially announced in November of last year that he would be running for the presidency a second time.
Biden officially declared his intention to run for reelection in 2024 in late April.
Early polls indicated that Biden is trailing not only Trump in a potential 2024 match up but other candidates as well, including former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley and Senator Tim Scott, who has since dropped out of the race.