Outgoing President Joe Biden penned a final goodbye letter to the American people today, less than one week before President-elect Donald Trump takes office.
In his letter, Biden said that the “soul of America” remains “at stake.”
A full release of the letter was posted on the White House website today.
Below is are partial snippets from Biden’s letter.
“I ran for president because I believed that the soul of America was at stake. The very nature of who we are was at stake. And, that’s still the case,” Biden, 82, wrote ahead of an 8 p.m. Oval Office speech capping off his four-year term.
“America is an idea stronger than any army and larger than any ocean. It’s the most powerful idea in the history of the world. That idea is that we are all created equal, endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” he added.
“We’ve never fully lived up to this sacred idea, but we’ve never walked away from it either. And I do not believe the American people will walk away from it now.”
Throughout the letter, Biden used familiar anti-Trump framing in his “Battle for the Soul of the Nation” speech outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia ahead of the 2022 midterms.
Biden called it the privilege of his life to serve the country for over 50 years sharing his “modest” beginnings to the Oval Office.
“It has been the privilege of my life to serve this nation for over 50 years. Nowhere else on Earth could a kid with a stutter from modest beginnings in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Claymont, Delaware, one day sit behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office as President of the United States. I have given my heart and my soul to our nation. And I have been blessed a million times in return with the love and support of the American people.”
“History is in your hands. The power is in your hands. The idea of America lies in your hands. We just have to keep the faith and remember who we are. We are the United States of America, and there is simply nothing beyond our capacity when we do it together.”