Biden ‘not confident’ of peaceful transition of power in US

US President Joe Biden has said he doubts that power will be transferred peacefully in January 2025, after the November presidential election, whether it is won by a Democrat or Republican.

Biden made the statement to CBS News on Wednesday in his first interview since dropping out of the race in July, answering the journalist’s question on whether he thought there would be a peaceful transfer of power.

“If Trump wins, no I’m not confident at all. If Trump loses, I’m not confident at all,” Biden replied.

The US president lamented that the public was not taking Trump’s past comments about a “bloodbath” seriously.

“He means what he says. We don’t take him seriously. He means it. All the stuff about ‘If we lose, there’ll be a bloodbath, it’ll have been a stolen election,’” he said, adding that “you can’t love your country only when you win.”

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Biden was referring to a speech Republican presidential candidate and former US President Donald Trump made at an Ohio rally in March, while on the campaign trail. The word “bloodbath” caused controversy in the US media, with a number of outlets quoting Trump out of context. The Republican frontrunner later claimed he was referring to the risks Chinese competition posed to the American automotive manufacturing industry when he used the term. He pledged to slap crippling tariffs on Chinese imported cars if he wins the election, and warned of a “bloodbath” for the US automotive industry if he loses.

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Biden’s reference to Trump’s “bloodbath” comment comes at a time of increasingly hostile rhetoric between Democrats and Republicans. Last month, Biden expressed the “need for us to lower the temperature in our politics,” after a failed assassination attempt on Trump.

The former US president narrowly avoided a bullet in the head at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, when a shot grazed his ear in an attack that killed one member of the audience and injured two others. The gunman was later identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks, who allegedly fired eight shots with an AR-style rifle from a nearby rooftop before being killed by a Secret Service sniper.

The head of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, tendered her resignation in July, amid scrutiny over the incident.