Washington: US President Joe Biden on Sunday said that he decided to withdraw from the presidential election because he did not want to create "a real distraction" for the Democrats and let them fully concentrate on preventing former president Donald Trump from regaining the White House. In his first interview since ending his re-election campaign on July 21, Biden said that he had "no serious problem" with his health, but added that the highest priority had to be defeating former President Trump.
"We must, we must, we must defeat Trump," Biden told CBS Sunday Morning in an interview.
"The polls we had showed that it was a neck-and-neck race, would have been down to the wire. But what happened was, a number of my Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate thought that I was gonna hurt them in the races," Biden said.
"I was concerned if I stayed in the race, that would be the topic. You'd be interviewing me about 'Why did Nancy Pelosi say…' 'Why did so-and-so…' And I thought it'd be a real distraction, number one,” he said when asked about the reasons for him taking the unprecedented decision to drop out of the presidential race in the middle of the election campaign.
"Number two, when I ran the first time, I thought of myself as being a transition President. I can't even say how old I am; it's hard for me to get it outta my mouth. But things got moving so quickly, it didn't happen and the combination was that I thought it a critical issue for me still - it's not a joke - maintaining this democracy,” the 81-year-old president said.
"I thought it was important. Because, although it's a great honour being president, I think I have an obligation to the country to do what [is] the most important thing you can do, and that is, we must, we must, we must defeat Trump," he said.
Responding to a question, Biden said a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas is still possible. "The plan I put together, endorsed by the G-7, endorsed by the UN Security Council, is still viable. I'm working literally every single day and my whole team to see to it that it doesn't escalate into a regional war, but it easily can,” he said. Observing that democracy works, Biden said he has been able to prove that it worked. “Look at what we've been able to do. We've created 16 million jobs and created real new jobs. We've gotten around the brink of having the private sector invest over a trillion dollars in the American economy,” he said.
Biden said that he had a bad debate because he was sick. “But I have no serious problem,” he said, adding that he will do whatever he can to help Vice President Kamala Harris win the presidential elections now that she is the Democratic party’s presidential candidate.
(With inputs from agency)
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