Hillary Clinton says Biden’s re-election bid was a ‘terrible mistake’

NEW YORK – Hillary Clinton suggested in a new interview that the Democratic Party’s loss in 2024 boiled down to a “terrible miscalculation” – US President Joe Biden’s decision to run for re-election.

At an event in Manhattan on June 15, Clinton told The New Yorker’s editor, David Remnick, that Biden had made a “terrible mistake for himself, his legacy and for the country” in trying to run again at age 81.

If Biden had decided to “pass the torch” and the Democratic Party had held a competitive presidential primary, Clinton told Remnick, “whoever emerged from that contest – whether it was the vice-president, or a governor, or a senator or anybody else – would have beaten Donald Trump”.

Clinton’s assessment came at moment of renewed scrutiny of the mistakes that led to vice-president Kamala Harris’ loss to Trump in 2024.

In May, the Democratic National Committee released an incomplete, error-filled autopsy of the election that faulted the Biden White House for how it positioned Harris for the race before Biden’s late exit. (It did not deeply analyse Biden’s initial decision to run for re-election.)

And in late May, Jill Biden, Biden’s wife, told CBS News Sunday Morning that she had been “scared” during Biden’s disastrous performance against Trump in the first 2024 presidential debate.

“I thought, ‘Oh, my God, he’s having a stroke,’” said Jill Biden, who pushed her husband to stay in the race after the debate.

Joe Biden ultimately left the race in late July 2024, immediately putting his weight behind Harris, his vice-president, but leaving her just three months to build her own campaign before Election Day.

Clinton said Harris had lost in part because of how little time she had to stage a campaign, and in part because it was difficult for the vice-president to criticise the unpopular Biden.

“Some people didn’t want to hear anything from any candidate, especially somebody that he picked to be the vice-president, criticising him,” Clinton told Remnick at the event, held at the 92nd Street Y.

“If it had been a governor or somebody else who had emerged from a different process, they could have done a lot more separating themselves from him.”

A spokesperson for Biden, TJ Ducklo, declined to comment on Clinton’s remarks. NYTIMES

• This article originally appeared in The New York Times.