US President Joe Biden has withdrawn from the presidential election.
The president announced his withdrawal from the race in a letter addressed to Americans on Sunday.
Since his poor performance against Donald Trump in the presidential elections debate in June, there have been fears about Biden’s capacity to stand for the election later this year.
In his letter, 81-year-old US president, said his decision to stand down was in the interest of his party and the country.
“While it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term,” Biden wrote in a letter posted on X.
“I will speak to the Nation later this week in more detail about my decision.”
Biden thanked Vice President Kamala Harris for “being an extraordinary partner” but did not endorse her to be his replacement as the Democratic Party presidential nominee in his letter.
His withdrawal caps a singular national political career, bookended by Richard Nixon’s fall and Trump’s rise. He mounted four presidential bids. He spent 36 years in the U.S. Senate representing tiny Delaware. He rose to the chairmanships of the powerful Judiciary and Foreign Relations committees. And he served eight years as Barack Obama’s vice president.
Biden’s decision to exit the race less than a month before his party’s convention and a few months before voters head to the polls is unprecedented in the modern political era.
The last sitting president to abandon a re-election bid was Lyndon Johnson, whose expansion of the Vietnam War in the 1960s split the Democratic Party. But Johnson’s announcement came in March 1968 — eight months before that election.
“We’re in uncharted waters,” said Barbara Perry, a presidential studies professor at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. “No president has dropped out or died this close to the convention.”
