Inside Biden's fury at AG Merrick Garland and why he blames the Trump prosecutor for his election defeat
President Joe Biden is said to regret choosing Merrick Garland as attorney general and blames the federal judge for his election defeat.
Nearing the end of his presidency, Biden has admitted that he regrets appointing Garland because the justice department has aggressively prosecuted his son Hunter, but slowed down prosecution for President-elect Donald Trump, sources close to the matter told The Washington Post.
In 2020, Biden also faced harsh criticism for going with Garland as two of his closest aides and friends - Former senator Ted Kaufman and Mark Gitenstein - tried to persuade the president to name former Alabama state Senator Doug Jones as attorney general instead.
The 46th president soon set his sights on Garland, who was highly recommended to him by his former chief of staff Ron Klain, but furious Democrats quickly opposed his decision, saying it severely damaged his presidency.
Democrats believe that if the justice department moved faster on Trump allegedly trying to overturn the 2020 election and mishandling classified documents, the incoming president might have faced trial before the recent election, ultimately damaging his political career, sources told the outlet.
Other than regretting Garland, Biden is also remorseful about stepping down to let Vice President Kamala Harris run for president as he and some of his aides believe he could have won another term.
Recently, Biden and his aides - who have chosen to remain anonymous - have admitted that they believe he could have defeated Trump again, but have remained cautious about blaming Harris or her campaign for losing to Trump in November.
Some of his aides have also voiced that Biden's sudden decision to withdraw from the race and hold onto his presidency for too long was disastrous, leaving Harris with just over three months to prepare to take over, the outlet reported.
President Joe Biden regrets choosing Merrick Garland as attorney general, as he blames the federal judge for his defeat against Donald Trump
Biden has admitted that he regrets appointing Garland because the justice department has aggressively prosecuted his son Hunter, but slowed down in prosecuting President-elect Donald Trump, sources told The Washington Post
Despite Trump defeating Harris, Kaufman said Biden has 'accomplished a hell of a lot' as president of the United States.
'He accomplished a hell of a lot in a very difficult situation. Coming in after Trump with a bad economy, he still pulled people together.
'He did all this on infrastructure, and all the stuff he did with a one-vote majority in the Senate. Joe Biden did it with one vote,' Kaufman added.
Although some believe he made a change, other Democrats have made it clear that Biden's decision to run again was a mistake.
'Biden ran on the promise that he was going to be a transitional president, and in effect, have one term before handing it off to another generation,' Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal said.
'I think his running again broke that concept — the conceptual underpinning of the theory that he would end the Trump appeal, he would defeat Trumpism and enable a new era.'
Biden is also remorseful about stepping down to let Vice President Kamala Harris run for president as he and some of his aides believe he could have won another term
Some of his aides have also voiced that Biden's sudden decision to withdraw from the race and hold onto his presidency for too long was disastrous, leaving Harris with just over three months to prepare to take over
Others have said that Biden has lost touch with what the country needs at this time, adding that he and his supporters 'often yearn for a world that disappeared.'
'The job of a president is reading where the country, where the politics is, and winning in it,' Julian E. Zelizer, a presidential historian at Princeton University, told the outlet.
'And winning includes not having your party being defeated by the person you essentially promised to expunge from American politics.
'President Biden and his supporters often yearn for a world that disappeared. You can’t actually govern the way you did in the 1970s in 2021,' she added.
During much of his campaign, Trump has taken advantage of outlets that currently appeal to many Americans, and specifically the younger generations, including teaming up with famed podcaster Joe Rogan and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
Zelizer said Biden 'governed through traditional processes and institutions,' but it did not help get rid of 'the very intense polarization that exists in this country.'
'It didn’t change the picture of where he started, this anger in the electorate toward institutions, this support for a pretty radical conservative vision that Trump embodied.
'It didn’t do anything to end the very intense polarization that exists in this country,' she said.
Biden's national security advisor Jake Sullivan also agreed that Biden has been living in the past during his presidency.
'The president has been operating on a time horizon measured in decades, while the political cycle is measured in four years,' Sullivan said.
Despite that point, Sullivan added that Biden 'went with doing the things that really put America in a strong position.'
In recent days, Biden has been trying to tie up loose ends before Trump takes over the White House in just a couple of weeks.
President Biden has been forced to stop auctioning off materials used for the border wall after the Texas Attorney General stepped in to block the sales.
Others have said that Biden has lost touch with what the country needs at this time, while Trump has taken advantage of the digital movement in the US by joining Joe Rogan and Elon Musk during his campaign
The unused material was put up for grabs by Congress who put a plan in place on how to dispose of the excess product after ending wall construction in 2021.
Attorney General Ken Paxton said on Friday that he had stopped the administration from getting rid of any more before president-elect Trump takes office in January.
The Biden administration agreed with the court order, according to Fox News, allowing President Trump to use the materials.
Last week, Trump asked a court in the red state to intervene in the sales, accusing Biden of selling off the materials after it was required to do so by Congress.
Paxton's office said that the incumbent administration could be held in contempt of court if they go against the order.
The Southern state has long said they would continue to help Trump rebuild the wall at the southern border.
