This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/us/politics/joe-biden-2020-announcement.html

The article has changed 19 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 10 Version 11
Joe Biden Announces 2020 Run for President Joe Biden Announces 2020 Run for President
(about 1 hour later)
Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. announced Thursday that he would seek the Democratic nomination to challenge President Trump in 2020, marshaling his experience and global stature in a bid to lead a party increasingly defined by a younger generation that might be skeptical of his age and ideological moderation. Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. announced Thursday that he would seek the Democratic nomination to challenge President Trump in 2020, casting the election as a national emergency and asking Democrats to put the task of defeating Mr. Trump above all their other ambitions.
Mr. Biden, 76, is set to offer himself as a levelheaded leader for a country wracked by political conflict, a rationale he believes could attract a broad cross-section of voters who want to move on from Mr. Trump. In a three-and-a-half minute video that focused on excoriating Mr. Trump, Mr. Biden presented himself as a steely leader for a country wracked by political conflict. Unlike the wide field of Democrats competing for the affections of the left, Mr. Biden avoided almost any talk of policy or ideology, signaling that he believes voters will embrace him as a figure of stability and maturity even in a partisan primary election.
In a three-and-a-half minute video laying out his reasons for running, Mr. Biden chose not to talk about policy issues or his biography but instead began by recalling the white supremacist march through Charlottesville, Va., in 2017 and a counterprotest, and Mr. Trump’s comment that there were “very fine people on both sides.” In that moment, Mr. Biden said, “I knew the threat to our nation was unlike any I’d ever seen in my lifetime.” In doing so, Mr. Biden, 76, is making a bet of sorts that the Democratic Party’s leftward shift in recent years has been greatly overstated, and that the moral clarity of his rhetoric and his seeming strength as a general election candidate will overpower other considerations for Democratic voters who tend to prize youth, diversity and unapologetic liberalism.
“We are in the battle for the soul of this nation,” Mr. Biden said. “I believe history will look back on four years of this president and all he embraces as an aberrant moment in time. But if we give Donald Trump eight years in the White House, he will forever and fundamentally alter the character of this nation, who we are, and I cannot stand by and watch that happen.” Laying out for the first time why he wanted to run for president, Mr. Biden invoked the white supremacist march through Charlottesville, Va., that ended in bloodshed in 2017, and Mr. Trump’s comment that there were “very fine people on both sides.” In that moment, Mr. Biden said in the video, “I knew the threat to our nation was unlike any I’d ever seen in my lifetime.”
[Who’s in? Who’s out? Keep up with the 2020 field with our candidate tracker.] “We are in the battle for the soul of this nation,” Mr. Biden said, warning that if Mr. Trump is reelected, “He will forever and fundamentally alter the character of this nation, who we are, and I cannot stand by and watch that happen.”
Mr. Trump, in a Twitter post about Mr. Biden on Thursday morning, did not respond to those remarks, but instead lampooned the former vice president as “Sleepy Joe” and derided the Democratic field. Mr. Trump did not respond to Mr. Biden’s denunciation of his response to Charlottesville, responding instead with a taunt, calling Mr. Biden “Sleepy Joe” and deriding the Democratic field as having “demented ideas.”
“I only hope you have the intelligence, long in doubt, to wage a successful primary campaign,” he wrote. “It will be nasty — you will be dealing with people who truly have some very sick & demented ideas.” Mr. Biden enters the Democratic race as something of a front-runner, albeit one beset by challenges from all flanks and looming questions about his long political record. Allies of Mr. Biden believe he must take steps in short order to explain to voters his political evolution on a range of issues, including ones as elemental as criminal justice, abortion rights and the Iraq war.
Mr. Biden is seen by many Democrats as a trustee of former President Barack Obama’s legacy, perhaps capable of restoring the consensus-seeking liberalism of Mr. Obama’s administration. The former vice president has encouraged that perception, labeling himself to reporters in early April as an “Obama-Biden Democrat” and suggesting that accounts of the left wing’s ascendancy in the party were greatly exaggerated. In a sign he may recognize the urgency of that task, Mr. Biden recently spoke privately with Anita Hill, who was in 1991 was questioned harshly by a Senate committee led by Mr. Biden after she accused Clarence Thomas, now a Supreme Court justice, of sexual harassment. Mr. Biden expressed regret, according to an aide, who declined to specify when the conversation took place.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Obama issued a statement praising Mr. Biden without endorsing him, a sign of both the political value of that relationship and also the limits of what Mr. Obama might do to support his former running mate. Mr. Biden’s long-awaited entry effectively completes the list of Democratic candidates, a cast of 20 characters that is the most diverse presidential field ever. Atop it, for now, are two white men in their eighth decades of life — Mr. Biden and Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
On Thursday morning, at the Wilmington, Del., Amtrak station that bears his name, Mr. Biden told reporters he did not want Mr. Obama’s backing at the outset. Mr. Biden’s position as the leading Democratic candidate is an unfamiliar one for him. His two previous presidential bids, in 1988 and 2008, failed to catch on. Though he campaigned twice as former President Barack Obama’s running mate, Mr. Biden has never been the starring actor in a major political production of his own inception.
“I asked President Obama not to endorse and whoever wins this nomination should win it on their own merits,” Mr. Biden said in a brief exchange. The overarching question of Mr. Biden’s campaign is whether he can fill that role with sufficient competence and imagination to both dispel Democratic concerns about his personal discipline, and prove that he can inspire a younger generation of Democratic voters for whom he is a relatively distant figure.
Asked why he should be the party’s standard-bearer, he replied, “That’ll be for Democrats to decide.”
As Mr. Biden joins a race with 19 other Democratic candidates, he is in an unaccustomed political position: He is an early front-runner for the nomination, though by no means an imposing one. He has run four previous national campaigns — two as a little-noticed candidate for the presidential nomination in 1988 and 2008, and two as Mr. Obama’s running mate — but in a half-century career he has never been the starring actor in a major political production of his own inception.
The overarching question of Mr. Biden’s campaign is whether he can fill that role with sufficient competence and imagination, and dispel concerns within his party that he lacks the discipline to run an effective campaign or the vision to ignite Democrats’ enthusiasm.
In his announcement video, Mr. Biden’s opening argument to Democratic voters and the country at large attempted to set him above and apart from his party’s ideological dividing lines and crowded field of candidates. Rather than describe his political record or embrace left-wing policies that some Democrats and liberal activists are hungry for, Mr. Biden made a thematic attempt to define the Democratic primary in terms of a question: which candidate can beat Mr. Trump and restore normalcy.
[Biden on the issues: where he stands and how he’s changed.][Biden on the issues: where he stands and how he’s changed.]
One liberal advocacy group, Justice Democrats, announced on Thursday morning that it would oppose Mr. Biden’s candidacy. “The old guard of the Democratic Party failed to stop Trump, and they can’t be counted on to lead the fight against his divide-and-conquer politics today,” said Alexandra Rojas, the group’s executive director, in a statement. Mr. Biden is seen by most Democratic voters as a sympathetic figure, a trustee of Mr. Obama’s legacy whose life has been touched repeatedly by grievous tragedy. He has spoken frequently about the death of his first wife, Neilia, and his infant daughter in a 1972 car crash; the death of his son, Beau, in 2015 became an occasion of national mourning.
Mr. Biden will seek to make the case for himself in the coming days, giving his first television interview on Friday on ABC’s “The View,” where he memorably appeared in 2017 and comforted a co-host, Meghan McCain, a daughter of Senator John McCain, about her father’s battle with brain cancer. But Mr. Biden differs in profound ways, in his identity and political orientation, from the rising generation of voters and activists that has increasingly come to define the Democratic Party.
He will then barnstorm key primary states over the next few weeks, starting with remarks on “rebuilding an inclusive middle class” on Monday in Pittsburgh, followed by trips to Iowa and South Carolina and then proceeding to Nevada, California and New Hampshire by the middle of May. The Biden rollout is set to culminate in Philadelphia on May 18, with a speech about “unifying America,” his campaign said. Mr. Biden is a white man who became a senator during Richard Nixon’s presidency, who belongs to a party seen as prizing youth and diversity. He is a centrist and a determined champion of bipartisanship, vying to lead a coalition that views the Republican Party as irretrievably malignant. And he plans to finance his campaign chiefly through large contributions from traditional party bankrollers, in an age of grassroots hostility to corporations and the very wealthy.
Mr. Biden unveiled a list of about two dozen senior aides to help steer his political operation and confirmed that a longtime adviser, Greg Schultz, would be his campaign manager. Among the staffers were Symone Sanders, who was a highly visible spokeswoman for the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016, and Michelle Kwan, the Olympic ice skater who worked for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Mr. Biden has appeared alternately eager to campaign as Mr. Obama’s natural heir, and also wary of subsuming his candidacy entirely in nostalgia for an earlier administration. He did not mention Mr. Obama in his announcement video, and he told reporters, in a brief exchange Thursday at the Wilmington, Del., Amtrak station that bears his name, that he did not want Mr. Obama’s backing at the outset.
His long-awaited entry effectively completes the field of major Democratic candidates, and may goad the party’s large number of would-be presidents to compete more aggressively for attention in a race currently framed by two outsize political characters in their eighth decades of life — Mr. Biden and Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont. “I asked President Obama not to endorse and whoever wins this nomination should win it on their own merits,” Mr. Biden said.
Mr. Biden’s rivals have taken encouragement in recent weeks from signs of unsteadiness and indecision in his camp. Mr. Biden spent much of this month attempting, in fits and starts, to address a wave of stories in which women described his physical manner as discomfiting and excessively intimate. And his advisers have repeatedly explored and then disavowed a range of offbeat or daring plans, including announcing a running mate early in his campaign — perhaps Stacey Abrams, the Georgia Democrat — or kicking off his campaign in Charlottesville, as a rebuke to Mr. Trump. A spokeswoman for Mr. Obama issued a statement on Thursday praising Mr. Biden warmly but not endorsing him, and over the last year Mr. Obama has quietly encouraged a range of other candidates to pursue the presidency.
It is unclear how bold a campaign Mr. Biden intends to run, and whether he will seek to electrify the Democratic coalition or merely satisfy its thirst for a champion who appears up to the job of beating Mr. Trump. The dividing line in Democratic politics around Mr. Biden’s candidacy was immediately apparent on Thursday morning. He was instantly endorsed by a number of prominent party moderates, including Senators Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Doug Jones of Alabama and Chris Coons and Tom Carper, both of Delaware.
Mr. Biden is expected to face intensive scrutiny of his decades-long political record as vice president and a Delaware senator, and his political allies believe he must take steps in short order to articulate publicly how his views have changed over time on fundamental Democratic concerns involving race and women’s rights. He has yet to allay concerns about the most contentious aspects of his career, including his treatment of Anita Hill during the confirmation hearings of Justice Clarence Thomas. At the same time, one of the more influential liberal activist groups, Justice Democrats, issued a scathing statement rejecting Mr. Biden as an option in the race and describing him as a symbol of the Democratic establishment that was unable to stop Mr. Trump in 2016.
Kate Bedingfield, a spokeswoman for Mr. Biden, said on Thursday that Mr. Biden had expressed “regret” in a personal conversation with Ms. Hill. “The old guard of the Democratic Party failed to stop Trump, and they can’t be counted on to lead the fight against his divide-and-conquer politics today,” said Alexandra Rojas, the group’s executive director, in a statement.
[Biden on the issues: where he stands and how he’s changed.]
Mr. Biden is poised to embark in the coming days on an ambitious and highly visible campaign schedule. After a fund-raising event in Philadelphia on Thursday evening, Mr. Biden is scheduled to appear on Friday on ABC’s “The View,” in his first television interview as a candidate.
Next week, Mr. Biden plans to visit a Pittsburgh union hall on Monday to make remarks on the economy, and the early primary states of Iowa and South Carolina shortly thereafter. Mr. Biden’s barnstorming tour will take him to Nevada, New Hampshire and California before it culminates in a May 18 address about “unifying America,” his campaign said.
Mr. Biden unveiled a list of about two dozen senior aides to help steer his political operation and confirmed that a longtime adviser, Greg Schultz, would be his campaign manager. Among the staffers were Symone Sanders, a highly visible spokeswoman for the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016, and Michelle Kwan, the Olympic ice skater who worked for Hillary Clinton in 2016.
The former vice president is expected to face intensive scrutiny of his lengthy political record, and he has yet to allay concerns about the most contentious aspects of his career. In recent months, he expressed remorse — without quite apologizing — for having supported draconian tough-on-crime measures in the 1980s and 1990s, and said he wished the Hill-Thomas hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee had gone differently.
Kate Bedingfield, a spokeswoman for Mr. Biden, said on Thursday that Mr. Biden had gone somewhat further in a personal conversation with Ms. Hill.
“They had a private discussion where he shared with her directly his regret for what she endured and his admiration for everything she has done to change the culture around sexual harassment in this country,” Ms. Bedingfield said.“They had a private discussion where he shared with her directly his regret for what she endured and his admiration for everything she has done to change the culture around sexual harassment in this country,” Ms. Bedingfield said.
Marc Morial, the president of the National Urban League, said Mr. Biden would bring a unique set of political strengths to the race, but would also need to address elements of his record that progressives might view as suspect. Mr. Morial, who is not backing a candidate, said he had spoken with Mr. Biden this week and urged him to attend the National Urban League’s July conference to lay out his views on civil rights. Marc Morial, the president of the National Urban League, said Mr. Biden would bring a unique set of political strengths to the race, but would also need to address aspects of his record that make progressives uneasy.
“I think it’s important that Biden perhaps help people understand that, as a 40-year member of Congress, his views have evolved,” Mr. Morial said, suggesting that Mr. Biden might be well-equipped to make an explanation: “He is one of the few guys who is probably as comfortable talking to a group of truck drivers as he is in an African-American church.” “I think it’s important that Biden perhaps help people understand that, as a 40-year member of Congress, his views have evolved,” said Mr. Morial, who suggested Mr. Biden might be well-equipped to make an explanation: “He is one of the few guys who is probably as comfortable talking to a group of truck drivers as he is in an African-American church.”
Mr. Biden has consistently led the Democratic primary polls, collecting between a quarter and a third of the vote, and he is expected to receive robust support from donors in the Democratic establishment and the national business community. Last week he began accepting financial contributions for his candidacy, and his wealthy supporters are expected to hold a major fund-raising event in Philadelphia to help propel him into the race.
Mr. Biden has described himself to associates as the candidate best equipped to defeat Mr. Trump, mainly by reclaiming historically Democratic areas of the Midwest, where many lower-income white voters have abandoned his party in a broad cultural and racial realignment.
[Make sense of the people, issues and ideas shaping American politics with our newsletter.][Make sense of the people, issues and ideas shaping American politics with our newsletter.]
A white male centrist in his 70s, Mr. Biden also resembles few of the Democrats who electrified the party during last year’s midterm elections. And because he delayed so long in joining the race, Mr. Biden now finds himself up against an array of competitors who have already found their footing in different ways. A number of Mr. Biden’s competitors have already had months to find their footing in the race. The field includes muscular fund-raisers like Mr. Sanders, Senator Kamala Harris of California and former Representative Beto O’Rourke of Texas; intriguing underdogs, like Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind.; and policy-minded liberals like Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Cory Booker of New Jersey, who have helped frame the race as a contest of ideas.
The field includes muscular fund-raisers like Mr. Sanders, Senator Kamala Harris of California and former Representative Beto O’Rourke of Texas; intriguing underdogs, like Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., who have excited voters with their novelty; and policy-minded liberals like Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Cory Booker of New Jersey, who have helped frame the race as a contest of ideas. Mr. Biden’s rivals avoided criticizing him on the day of his announcement, and several sent out fund-raising appeals professing confidence in their own prospects. Ms. Harris praised Mr. Biden’s “wealth of knowledge,” before affirming, “I intend to win.” Mr. O’Rourke wrote that the primary was “wide open.”
Mr. Biden’s rivals avoided criticizing him on the day of his announcement, and several sent out fund-raising appeals professing confidence in their own prospects. In one such email, Ms. Harris praised Mr. Biden’s “wealth of knowledge,” before affirming, “I intend to win.” Mr. O’Rourke wrote that the primary was “wide open,” and the Sanders campaign texted supporters asking for money and saying, “Today is an important day to show you stand with Bernie.” As the race proceeds, other Democrats may be keen to take on Mr. Biden’s record, including his background as a Delaware senator who was highly attentive to the state’s credit card industry and voted in 2002 to authorize war in Iraq.
Some of those candidates may be keen to take on Mr. Biden’s record, including his background as a Delaware senator who was highly attentive to the state’s credit card industry. Ms. Warren has been bluntly critical of Mr. Biden in the past, and much of his legislative history conflicts with the central concerns of Mr. Sanders, the leading liberal populist in the race. Mr. Biden’s private endeavors could also become political targets. He has earned millions of dollars in paid speeches and book deals since leaving office, and has created a network of nonprofits and academic centers that employ many of his trusted aides. He intends to shut down the most prominent of those groups, the Biden Foundation.
Mr. Biden has already been facing tough scrutiny of his shifting policy positions over the decades, on matters like civil rights, abortion and the war in Iraq. Rival Democrats have taken encouragement from several recent signs of unsteadiness in his camp, including his halting response this month to a wave of stories about his physical behavior with women. And his advisers repeatedly explored and then disavowed some offbeat or daring plans, including announcing a running mate early in his campaign.
Confronting skepticism from his own party, Mr. Biden has recently expressed regret for supporting stringent tough-on-crime measures in the 1980s and 1990s, and he made a partial attempt at voicing contrition for the aggressive questioning Ms. Hill faced when she accused Justice Thomas of sexual harassment. Mr. Biden’s candidacy is a bet, above all, that none of that will matter in comparison to voters’ alarm at the possibility of Mr. Trump’s re-election.
Mr. Biden’s private endeavors and personal finances could also become political targets. He appears to have earned upward of $12 million since leaving office, mainly through a book deal and dozens of paid speeches, and he has created a network of nonprofits and academic centers that employ his advisers and advocate his priorities. His aides have drawn up plans to shut down his flagship nonprofit, the Biden Foundation.
Mr. Biden promised in January, through a spokesman, that he would give a full accounting of his assets if he entered the presidential race, including his tax returns.
There are few modern examples of a man of Mr. Biden’s age assuming the leadership of a Western democratic power. The precedents that exist have tended to arise from moments of military conflict or social turbulence: Georges Clemenceau becoming France’s premier during World War I at the age of 76, or Winston Churchill returning as prime minister in the 1950s, also at 76.There are few modern examples of a man of Mr. Biden’s age assuming the leadership of a Western democratic power. The precedents that exist have tended to arise from moments of military conflict or social turbulence: Georges Clemenceau becoming France’s premier during World War I at the age of 76, or Winston Churchill returning as prime minister in the 1950s, also at 76.
Mr. Biden would be 78 on Inauguration Day in 2021, and it remains to be seen whether voters will view him as a similar kind of political savior, or the times as equally dire.Mr. Biden would be 78 on Inauguration Day in 2021, and it remains to be seen whether voters will view him as a similar kind of political savior, or the times as equally dire.
Mr. Biden’s imposing tenure in government has long been twined in voters’ eyes with a biography touched several times by crippling tragedy. He has spoken frequently about the death of his first wife, Neilia, and his infant daughter in a 1972 car crash. And the death of his son, Beau, in 2015 became an occasion of national mourning.