Joe Biden’s last Oval Office address as president – the closing speech of his over five-decade political career – set off an immediate stream of reaction days before the president is set to return to life as a private citizen.
While he tried to strike an optimistic tone, his speech was peppered with dire warnings to the American public about the upcoming four years under the second Donald Trump administration, including an "avalanche" of misinformation and disinformation and a tech-industrial complex.
“That was maybe one of the best speeches I’ve ever heard Joe Biden given,” former Obama official David Axelrod said on CNN immediately after the speech. He added: “This was a love letter to the country and I think it was a very, very appropriate farewell.”
Harry Sisson, a Gen Z influencer and activist, echoed Axelrod’s feelings, telling his followers on X that Biden “just gave the best speech of his presidency,” which he called “incredibly moving.”
Ashley Etienne former communications director for Vice President Kamala Harris called Biden’s warnings of an oligarchy “taking shape in America” and fears over what he labeled a “tech-industrial complex” as “incredibly poignant and relevant.”
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Barack Obama thanked his former vice president for “his lifetime of service to this country we love” in a Facebook post praising Biden’s accomplishments as president.
“Four years ago, in the middle of a pandemic, we needed a leader with the character to put politics aside and do what was right,” Obama wrote. “That’s what Joe Biden did.”
But MAGA world was predictably less moved by Biden’s farewell address.
“Joe Biden didn’t call out Iran, China, or the wars he helped create in his farewell speech—but he attacked American citizens, calling them ‘oligarchs’ and ‘a threat to democracy,’” Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) wrote on X. “A fitting end to a presidency defined by blame and failure.”
First lady Jill Biden was joined by Hunter Biden and his wife, as well as Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff, in the Oval Office as the president delivered his address, CNN reported.
Biden called Harris, who led the Democratic ticket after he dropped out of the 2024 campaign, a “historic vice president.”