WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden said in an interview published Wednesday that he still believes he could have defeated President-elect Donald Trump in the 2024 election but is unsure whether he could have served a full second term.
“It’s presumptuous to say that, but I think so,” Biden told USA Today during a wide-ranging interview when asked if he could have won had he not left the campaign in July.
Biden said he still thinks he could have defeated Trump because of the polls he reviewed, according to USA Today. However, he was not confident that he could have served a full second term. “I don’t know,” he said.
Before Biden dropped out of the 2024 race in July, some polls showed him trailing Trump or the race in a dead heat.
Announcing his decision to withdraw, Biden said: “While it has been my intention to seek re-election, I believe it is in the best interests of my party and the country for me to resign and focus solely on fulfill my duties as President. President for the remainder of my term.”
Biden immediately endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party’s 2024 presidential nominee, later saying in a prime-time speech that he thought “the best path forward is to pass the torch to a new generation.”
His decision came after weeks of mounting pressure from leaders within his own party, including former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to withdraw from the presidential race. The growing uprising followed Biden’s devastating debate performance in late June, which brought his health, age and cognitive skills into question.
Some Democrats later expressed the wish that Biden had decided not to run for re-election, or at least drop out much earlier in the process.
Biden told USA Today that he thinks “the only advantage of being an old man is that I have known every major world leader for a long time.”
“I had a perspective on each of them and their interests,” he said. “And so I think it’s helped me navigate some of the fundamental changes that are happening, whether it’s in Europe, in Latin America, in the Middle East, in the United States. Far East.”
Ultimately, Trump won the election after receiving 312 electoral votes, compared to Harris’ 226 electoral votes. He won the popular vote with 49.8% to 48.3%.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
