US President Joe Biden has announced that he will seek re-election for the presidency in 2024, with Vice-President Kamala Harris again his running mate.
“Every generation has a moment where they have had to stand up for democracy. To stand up for their fundamental freedoms. I believe this is ours. That’s why I’m running for re-election as president of the United States. Join us. Let’s finish the job,” Biden wrote on Twitter, along with a video.
Now 80 and already the oldest president in US history, Biden had long signaled he would run for another four-year term.
In a video to launch his bid to retain the White House, he cast the next election as a fight for democracy and personal freedom, saying: “Let’s finish the job“.
Donald Trump has already launched his bid, meaning the pair could be set for a rematch of the 2020 election in November next year.
With Biden’s Democrats performing better than expected in last year’s midterm elections, he is unlikely to face much competition from within his own party.
But an NBC News poll recently found that 70 percent of Americans, and just over half of Democrats, believe he should not run again.
The 2024 campaign trail will look quite different for Biden compared with his last run.
As an incumbent candidate, he’ll have to balance his job leading the country with his efforts to sway voters in his favor.
He is likely to point to his accomplishments from the past two years, including major infrastructure and climate laws, as evidence he is up to the task.
The trail will look markedly different for Biden this time around for another reason: The president did much of his campaigning for the 2020 election virtually from his home in Delaware due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
This time, it will be back to large events and campaign stops around the country to shake hands with voters.
Biden’s already invited top Democratic donors and fundraisers to meet with him later this week in Washington.
The video opens with footage of the violent US Capitol riots violence that erupted more than two years ago.
Images of the most provocative Republicans – from former President Donald Trump to Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene – flash across the screen.
There is a reminder too of Republican attempts to restrict abortion access, limit voter access and clamp down on the LGBT community.
In his launch video, Joe Biden tells voters that the “battle for the soul of America” he referenced during the 2020 election is raging on.
“This is not a time to be complacent,” he says.
Biden is already the oldest-ever US president – and in his 2024 run, he wants Americans to value his experience as a lawmaker as he asks for their trust once again.
Over the weekend, US media reported that Joe Biden had chosen his senior White House advisor Julie Chavez Rodriguez as his campaign manager.
In a press release accompanying Tuesday’s launch video, Biden confirmed the selection of Rodriguez, a long-time Latina Democratic operative with ties to former President Barack Obama and Vice-President Kamala Harris.
The rest of Biden’s top team for 2024 has also now taken shape.
Quentin Fulks, who previously served as campaign manager to Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock in a closely-watched race last year, will serve as Rodriguez’s deputy.
The campaign’s national co-chairs – initial leaders who will be key to on-the-ground organizing and volunteer efforts – are some of Biden’s most strident and long-term backers.
They include Jim Clyburn, the South Carolina congressman whose endorsement is widely credited with boosting Biden to the nomination in 2020; Michigan’s Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer; and Chris Coons and Lisa Blunt Rochester, lawmakers from Biden’s home state of Delaware.