Joe Biden’s Endless Rumination About Running for President

Joe Biden has entered another long season of indecision. In London this week, he teased that he’s not a presidential candidate “at this point.” In March, he told a university audience, “I have to be able to … look in the mirror and know that if I don’t run, it’s not because I’m afraid of losing, it’s not because I don’t want to take on the responsibility.” In February, he mused to Andrea Mitchell, “Is this right for me to do?” And last November, he told Vanity Fair: “I haven’t decided to run, but I’ve decided I’m not going to decide not to run.”

It’s a veritable callback to 2015, when Biden grappled at length with ambition and grief. The death of his son Beau that year weighed heavily; at the same time, his dream of being president—which he as a teenager—still burned incandescently. He went, “I don’t think any man or woman should run for president unless [they can say to voters] ‘You have my whole heart, my whole soul, my energy, and my passion to do this.’ And I’d be lying if I said that I knew I was there.” A month later, he announced he wouldn’t run in 2016. Three months after that, he second-guessed his decision and , “I regret it every day.”