Vice President Joe Biden Regrets Not Running For President
Vice President Joe Biden has daily regrets about not running for president of the United States, but at the same time said that it was the right thing to do.
“I regret it every day, but it was the right decision for my family and for me,” Biden told NBC Connecticut. “And I plan on staying deeply involved.”
Biden’s comments come during a slate of television interviews in which he pushed for President Barack Obama’s executive actions regarding gun control.
Just recently, Biden told the WVIT, a Connecticut television station that he was still haunted by the mass shootings of the 20 children who lost their lives in Newtown. In fact, he referred the children as “those beautiful little babies in classrooms like dolls, discarded.”
The vice president kept the option open for a while, sparking huge speculation in the summer of 2015 that he would be able to take on both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders for the Democratic nomination. However, on October 21, Biden held a press conference at the White House announcing to the public that he would not be seeking the presidential nomination after all.
With his wife, Jill, and President Barack Obama standing by his side in the infamous White House Rose Garden, the vice president stated that the potential opportunity for a successful campaign was over, noting his family’s grief following the loss of his son, Beau. Beau Biden, who was only 46 years old, died of brain cancer last May.
Numerous reports even suggested that Biden’s son’s last wish was to see his dad enter the presidential race; however, Biden denied that claim. “Nothing like that ever, ever happened,” Biden said.
“While I will not be a candidate, I will not be silent,” he said on October 21 in a speech that focused on income inequality as well as a push for a movement to cure cancer. “I intend to speak out clearly and forcefully, to influence as much as I can where we stand as a party and where we need to go as a nation.”
As of right now, Biden plans on staying actively involved with the 2016 presidential run and thinks that the Democratic party has two “good” candidates running already. He didn’t mention the third candidate, Martin O’Malley, due to the simple fact that his campaign has failed to reach higher ground.
According to the New York Times, a Biden campaign would have placed him in the ring against Hillary Clinton, who currently leads polls for the Democratic nomination. Clinton’s previous role was secretary of state under President Obama’s administration.
“There’s real, robust debate between Hillary and Bernie, as there would have been if I had gotten in the race,” he said. “There has been no personal attacks that I’m aware of or any consequence. It’s not a bunch of serendipity out there.”
In regard to the Republican party, Biden noted that their campaign hasn’t been “very illuminating”.
“You know, the kinds of things that Ted Cruz and Donald Trump were saying are so inconsistent,” said Biden, whose debate against now-Speaker of the House Paul Ryan in the 2012 campaign was considered to be a huge victory for President Obama’s camp.
Biden recently has spoken to three GOP candidates, who all told him that the current Republican campaign has been “crazy, absolutely crazy.”
[Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images]
