US Election: Who is Joe Biden?

Joe Biden is the current president of the United States, and will be the Democratic Party's presidential candidate for the 2024 election.

He has a huge amount of political experience gained over a very long career in politics. He first became a senator more than 50 years ago in 1972.

In 2021, aged 78, he became the oldest person in the history of the United States to be sworn in as president.

He won the 2020 presidential election beating his Republican rival, Donald Trump who he will be facing again in the 2024 vote.

There are two main political parties in the US, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.

Although he is the current US president, Mr Biden's re-election is not guaranteed.

Early opinion polls suggest there is a lot of support among voters for the Republican Party and their presumptive presidential nominee, Donald Trump.

Until Mr Biden became the president, Donald Trump was the oldest president the US had ever had.

Mr Trump was aged 70 when he was sworn in as the 45th president of the US in 2017. He is now 77.

There are some voters who feel President Biden is too old to run for re-election at 81.

Mr Biden has publicly acknowledged that critics have "legitimate" questions about his age, but in response said "the only thing I can say is, watch me".

At university Mr Biden studied law. Then, when he was 29 he became one of the youngest senators in US history and remains, to-date, Delaware's longest-serving US senator.

He became President Barack Obama's vice president in 2009, and remained in that role until Mr Obama finished his second term as president.

Mr Biden was elected as the 46th President of the United States in 2020, and in his first few weeks in office reversed many of the actions of his predecessor Mr Trump.

This included the US rejoining the Paris Agreement on climate change and reversing Mr Trump's decision to leave the World Health Organisation.

In 2021, President Biden signed a bill into law called the American Rescue Plan - a $1.9 trillion (about £1.5trn) budget to help Americans cope with the economic effects of the coronavirus pandemic.

In April 2021 he announced his plan to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan, where they had been for 20 years.

While the decision to withdraw US troops was popular with many Americans, Mr Biden was criticised for the way in which the withdrawal happened.

When US troops and other foreign forces left, a military group called the Taliban quickly swept to power in Afghanistan, where they remain in charge.

In other conflicts, Mr Biden has shown support for Ukraine in the war against Russia, and for Israel in its war with Hamas in Gaza.

Mr Biden has said his plan for re-election is to "finish the job" - suggesting he wants to carry on with many of the things he is already doing.

In a speech in January 2024, he said his priority was "the defence, protection and preservation of American democracy".

Mr Biden has also promised to introduce more laws to tackle gun violence and defend the Affordable Care Act, sometimes referred to as Obamacare.

But some have said he has not handled key issues like the economy and immigration well.

The head of the US national bank said inflation - the amount by which goods and services become more expensive over time - was "still too high" and it wasn't clear how inflation was going to be tackled.

In February, nine politicians from Mr Biden's own party wrote a letter asking him to modernise US immigration laws, which they described as "outdated" and unable to deal with "unprecedented" levels of "global migration".

His running mate is Kamala Harris, who is the current vice president of the United States.

Mrs Harris is also the first female vice president in US history, as well as the first black and South Asian American to take on the job.