President Joe Biden’s decision to exit the presidential race in July was motivated in no small part by the high-profile struggles that plagued his son, Hunter Biden, in the final years of his first term — leaving him with a “crushing” sense of guilt that those close to the outgoing president say plagued him more than the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
In his new book, “War,” famed Watergate reporter Bob Woodward offers readers an intimate look inside both the Trump and Biden presidencies at some of their most vulnerable moments; offering a rare, split-screen view into the thinking of two very different leaders as they stared down some of the biggest foreign policy challenges and security risks in modern memory.
Fox News obtained an early copy of the book ahead of its release next week.
Woodward’s book captures the more intimate moments of both presidencies, as well. For Biden, this includes the aftermath of his disastrous performance at the first presidential debate in June — watched by an estimated 51 million people — and the torrent of pressure it unleashed within the Democratic Party for Biden to exit the race.
Among party leaders and donors, it crystallized long-held fears that Biden, 81, was no longer fit to hold his own in a second match-up against Donald Trump. Their panic was matched only by their sense of urgency and the ticking clock they had to select a suitable nominee.
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President Joe Biden and former U.S. President Donald Trump during the first presidential debate. (Eva Marie Uzcategui/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
As Woodward reports, Biden struggled mightily to accept that consensus — first, by attempting to brush off his catastrophic performance as a bad night and an event he could recover from in the months ahead. The tsunami of pressure on him to drop out only got stronger.
In fact, according to Woodward, Biden was leaning in the direction of staying in the race on July 4, when he met with Secretary of State Antony Blinken for a private lunch. Blinken, who had shown up to the lunch prepared for a difficult conversation, told Woodward that Biden still believed he could win a second term as president — a title he had chased all his life and finally achieved.
In his telling, among the factors ultimately driving his decision to bow out was the scrutiny and legal troubles surrounding his son Hunter.
The toll his son’s troubles had taken was apparent when the two met, Woodward reports. Blinken, in his telling, spoke frankly to Biden about dropping out. “I don’t want to see your legacy jeopardized,” he said.
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President Biden hugs his son Hunter Biden during the Democratic National Convention Monday, Aug. 19, 2024, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Sensing little headway, Blinken then tried a different approach. “Do you really want to be doing this for the next four years?” he asked.
Biden’s first term included overseeing the U.S. recovery from a global pandemic, the first war on European soil since World War II, and the start of Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon. Each day was charged with turmoil and lasting consequence. And yet, those close to Biden say it was his younger son, Hunter Biden, whose struggles seemed to weigh most heavily on the president.
Hunter’s troubles are described in the book as Biden’s “real war”: a constant source of preoccupation for the president, who was constantly fighting against his fatherly instincts to protect his son, his “beautiful boy,” as he called him — and to reconcile the deep sense of guilt he felt, in knowing his presidency had been a driving factor behind much of the scrutiny surrounding his son.
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Hunter Biden, accompanied by his mother, first lady Jill Biden, and his wife, Melissa Cohen Biden, exit federal court in Wilmington, Del. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
For Biden, this knowledge left him heartbroken” and affected him more than the major crises playing out abroad in Europe and the Middle East, sources told Woodward took the president “off an even keel,” preoccupied him and taken “a lot out of him.”
In describing the president’s inner turmoil to Woodward, Blinken himself teared up, thinking of his own relationships with two young children.
Biden, Blinken explained, “desperately” wanted to pull Hunter “out of the abyss” — to reel him in, to protect him — but his attempts and best efforts had failed.
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The book does not detail the extent to which Hunter’s legal woes and investigations were directly involved in the president’s decision to step down, which was likely the result of myriad factors, internal party pressures, and deeply personal considerations. The White House did not respond to Fox News’s request for comment on the matter.
The book offers an unflinching look at one of the president’s most emotionally difficult struggles, one which staying in the race would have ultimately exacerbated.
“War” will be out on bookstore shelves October 15.
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