WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is scheduled to deliver a farewell address to the nation Wednesday night, seizing a final opportunity to change Americans’ grim views of his presidency before he leaves the White House.
He plans to deliver a speech from the Oval Office at 8 PM ET, the latest in a series of comments on domestic policy and foreign relations aimed at solidifying his legacy. Earlier in the day, he announced a long-awaited ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas that could end more than a year of bloodshed in the Middle East.
But Biden is not leaving the White House in the way he had hoped. He originally intended to run for re-election, dismissing concerns from voters that he would be 86 years old after his second term. Biden stumbled in a debate with Republican Donald Trump and dropped out of the race under pressure from his own party.
He supported Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost to Trump in November. Now Biden is preparing to hand power over to someone he has described as an existential threat to the country’s democratic institutions.
In an open letter published Wednesday morning, he implicitly acknowledged that his promises have not yet been fulfilled.
“I ran for president because I believed the soul of America was at stake,” Biden wrote. “The essence of who we are is at stake. And it still is.”
The rest of the letter highlighted his accomplishments, including leading the country out of the coronavirus pandemic, supporting domestic manufacturing and limiting prescription drug costs.
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Wednesday night’s speech will cap not only Biden’s presidency, but 50 years of his political career. He was once the youngest U.S. senator at age 30, after being elected to represent his home state of Delaware in 1972.
Biden sought the presidency in 1988 and 2008 before becoming Barack Obama’s vice president. Biden was considered retiring from politics after serving two terms. But he returned to center stage in 2020 as the unlikely Democratic nominee, successfully ousting Trump from the White House.
“There is no place on earth where a child who stuttered from day one in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Claymont, Delaware, could one day sit behind a decisive desk in the Oval Office of the United States,” Biden wrote in the letter. “I gave my heart and soul for my people. And I have been blessed a million times over with the love and support of the American people in return.”
