He also announced he would take to the campaign trail to help Vice President Kamala Harris.

President Joe Biden called himself a “transition president” in his first interview after dropping out of the race, saying he exited because of fears within his party that he could cost Democrats seats in Congress.

In a pre-recorded interview that aired on “CBS Sunday Morning” with Robert Costa, Biden said he exited the race because he feared being a “distraction” for down-ballot candidates — and specifically name-dropped Nancy Pelosi.

“What happened was a number of my Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate thought that I was gonna hurt them in the races. And I was concerned if I stayed in the race, that would be the topic,” Biden said, adding that he expected to face questions about Pelosi’s role. “I thought it’d be a real distraction.”

The president said it was this — combined with his belief that he was a “transition president” — that ultimately helped him make his decision to end his reelection bid. It came after a disastrous debate performance triggered dozens of Democrats to call on Biden to pass the torch, especially as he dipped in the polls against former President Donald Trump.

“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,” Biden said. “But things got moving so quickly, it — didn’t happen.”

He also announced a campaign tour in Pennsylvania with Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was on Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate shortlist.

          • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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            3 months ago

            The civilian death toll in Gaza is about on par with how many the US killed in Afghanistan under Obama. However, Biden isn’t personally signing off on every drone strike, so as gross as it feels to try and make an objective comparison between these civilian crisises, I gotta go with Obama for the bigger bastard award.

              • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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                3 months ago

                And you believe history will look back fondly on invading Afghanistan for no real reason and drone striking everything that moved for 20 years?

                • abracaDavid@lemmy.today
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                  3 months ago

                  Lol no. If anyone survives all of this, history isn’t going to be kind to us about pretty much anything we’ve done since WW2.

              • Apollo42@lemmy.world
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                3 months ago

                Then I would suggest reading some American history, the nation was build upon a foundation of native corpses.

            • LotrOrc@lemmy.world
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              3 months ago

              46000 Afghani civilians died in total. Israel has done four times as much as that in 10 months, all funded and signed off by Biden.

              Did you read the Lancet study?

        • LotrOrc@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          Nah he just gives money to Israel so they can bomb every hospital, school, and an entire people off the face of the planet.

          And then says he is disappointed

          • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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            3 months ago

            And we’re comparing him to Obama, who funded the civilian deaths in Afghanistan and signed off on them personally and was in a position to end the whole thing rather than just pull funding from it. Obama is the worst person of the two.

            • LotrOrc@lemmy.world
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              3 months ago

              Biden is entirely in the position to end things by just not supplying them weapons and money every damn week

              • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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                3 months ago

                Israel isn’t reliant on our weapons. We could cut funding tomorrow and it’s not going to end this. Nothing we could do would end this short of declaring war on Israel ourselves.

                • LotrOrc@lemmy.world
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                  3 months ago

                  …? Where the fuck do you think they get their weapons? Why do you think the US has been approving billions of dollars of weapons sales to Israel per week for 10 months?

                  If the US stopped sending weapons Israel would have a week or two max of bombing left, using AMERICAN bombs

                  You’re just blatantly incorrext

                  • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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                    3 months ago

                    Where the fuck do you think they get their weapons

                    They buy some from the US, and they are also the 8th largest weapons manufacturer/exporter in the world.

                    Are you laboring under the delusion that nobody else in the world makes and sells weapons? What kind of American exceptionalist bullshit is that?

                    If the US stopped sending weapons Israel would have a week or two max of bombing left, using AMERICAN bombs

                    …followed by an indefinite amount of time using German, Chinese, French, Italian, English, and DOMESTICLY PRODUCED bombs