President Barack Obama dissuaded Joe Biden from running for president in the 2016 election.
Obama thought that if his vice president ran, he would be beaten in the Democratic primaries by Hillary Clinton. In summer of 2015, Obama “gently pressed” Biden against his 2016 aspiration, according to the New York Times.
He also worried about Biden’s state of mind should he have decided to run. Biden was grieving over the death of his 46-year-old son, Beau, who died of brain cancer in May of 2015. Obama sent his own strategist to discuss the long odds to Biden.
“The president was not encouraging,” Biden said after the meeting. The report follows news Thursday that around that same time Biden met with senior adviser David Plouffe at Obama’s behest. Plouffe, Obama’s 2008 campaign manager, asked Biden: “Do you really want it to end in a hotel room in Des Moines, coming in third to Bernie Sanders?”
Obama was by his vice president’s side when Biden announced in the White House Rose Garden he was not running. Clinton went on to win the nomination after a tougher-than-expected battle with Sanders but lost the general election to Donald Trump in one of the biggest political upsets in modern history.
Biden, 76, is now in the running for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. The most recent RealClearPolitics national average of polls has Biden leading the pack with 29.3% support. He claims he asked Obama not to endorse him in the 2020 race.
Although Obama aides say he will not endorse in Democratic primaries, his spokeswoman did praise Biden after he announced his campaign last week.
Choosing him as his running mate was “one of the best decisions he ever made,” said Katie Hill. “He relied on the vice president’s knowledge, insight, and judgment throughout both campaigns and the entire presidency. The two forged a special bond over the last 10 years and remain close today.”
