美国国家公共电台 NPR Biden Tells NPR He Has 'No Plans' To Run In 2020

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

He's well into his 70s, but Joe Biden doesn't seem to have lost much of his energy. The former vice 1 president has not discouraged talk of a run for president.

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

He's promoting a book called "Promise Me, Dad: A Year Of Hope, Hardship, And Purpose." It reflects on his late son, Beau's, battle with brain cancer. The theme of the book prompted a question from NPR's Michel Martin when she sat down with Biden yesterday.

MICHEL MARTIN, BYLINE 2: I couldn't help but wonder if this part of it has been hard. I mean, you revisited the year to write the book. And now, you're revisiting it to talk about it over and over again. What's this been like for you?

JOE BIDEN: Well, it's been a lot harder for me than I anticipated. And I found myself about three weeks ago when I realized the commitment I made to do this book tour that I wasn't - well, I'll be blunt with you. I've been fairly sure-footed about the things I'd done in my career. This is the one place that I feel the least sure-footed because the reason I wrote the book was I wanted people to know what a remarkable 3 man our son was. And I also wanted to give hope to people who have gone through what we're going through without anywhere near the support we've had and some with considerably 4 more difficult crises to face.

INSKEEP: Joe Biden's book comes as his party continues to grapple with the 2016 election and the way the Democratic Party handled the nomination 5 of Hillary Clinton. That's another subject he revisited in his conversation with Michel.

M. MARTIN: As of course you know, Donna Brazile, who was the interim 6 head of the DNC at the time - she replaced Debbie Wasserman Schultz - has now said in her new book that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's campaign dominated the DNC because they were raising money to pay their bills, and that she also says that she considered replacing Hillary Clinton with you as the Democratic nominee 7. So is that true that Hillary Clinton kind of had her thumb on the scale? And, two, did anybody talk to you about replacing her?

BIDEN: No one ever talked about replacing her. Had they, I would have made it clear I would not be any part of that. That's number one. Number two, what I've noticed, whoever the candidate is controls the DNC. I can't think of a time when - I've been there for eight presidents and the nominees 8 - whether it was George McGovern when I ran in 1972, all the way through to Bill Clinton, or when we were the - when the president was the nominee. And so I didn't find anything particularly unusual in the putative 9 nominee, you know, being the person who was the dominant 10 force in the DNC.

M. MARTIN: Do you think that the Russians interfered 11 in the 2016 election...

BIDEN: I know they did.

M. MARTIN: ...And if so, how?

BIDEN: I don't think. I know they did.

M. MARTIN: To what end?

BIDEN: Well, I'm not going to speculate in to what end, I assume is to help elect Trump 12 because all the negative stuff was directed against Hillary, number one. Number two, I'd been briefed before I left on it, when I still had the clearance 13. And every single solitary 14 major institution having to do with the intelligence community says they interfered. We're now turning out - all the stuff coming up on Facebook, all the stuff coming up. I mean, they were, at a minimum, trying to invoke 15 some sense of chaos 16 into the election. And I think it's pretty clear they were hoping that their efforts would elect Donald Trump.

M. MARTIN: This administration seems very dedicated 17 to specifically rolling back policies that you and President Obama put in place, and I'm wondering what it's like for you to watch that happen?

BIDEN: It's distasteful, number one. It's sad, number two. But I still have hope because I think on the big policies - for example, I got criticized for saying immediately after they got elected - saying they're going to repeal 18 Obamacare. And I jokingly said, lots of luck on their senior year, they're not going to be able to repeal it. And I was right. They can damage it but not repeal it. They're not going to be able to turn back what Barack and I did on gay rights and what we did on basic human rights. They're going to make it harder. They're going to slow it up, but they're not going to repeal. The American people have already crossed the Rubicon on the vast majority of these things.

Where they are going to do damage is when they attack basic fundamental ideals of what constitutes being an American. The idea that we had these guys coming out from under rocks and out of the woods carrying torches and chanting Nazi 19 slogans, anti-Semitic slogans in a historic town in the United States of America carrying Nazi flags with white supremacy 20 alongside them and that not being absolutely condemned 21, silence is complicity.

Not only was it not condemned, you had the president making a relative comparison between those there to stop them and those people. That is sick. That is dangerous. That's not who we are as Americans. That's the part I find the most damaging, the most dangerous, that it really does present - it not only casts an image across the world. Look. You know why we're the most powerful nation in the world. It's not just the example of our power, it's the power of our example.

M. MARTIN: So everybody and their brother has been asking if you're running in 2020, and I would probably get my reporter card revoked 22 if I didn't ask you. So I have to ask you.

BIDEN: The answer is no. I have no plans on running in 2020. This is - my focus is on my boy. I want people to know what an incredible man he was, and I want people to understand that there is hope afterwards. He's still with me. And I'm going to do everything I can to elect a Democratic Congress. But what people want me to say is under no circumstances will I run. That'd be a foolish thing to say. I don't know what's going to happen two years from now. But I have done nothing organizationally or structurally 23 or in any other way to prepare to run for president. That is not in the cards now.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

INSKEEP: What reporters like to call a non-denial denial from former Vice President Joe Biden speaking with NPR's Michel Martin.