Biden, eager for a 2020 rematch in November, is quick to anoint Trump as his 2024 rival

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is zeroing in on an expected rematch against Donald Trump after this week’s New Hampshire primaries, eager to sharpen the contrast with his predecessor.

Ten months from Election Day, Biden’s write-in victory in a New Hampshire race he didn’t formally contest put a fork in any plausible path to deny him a second turn at the Democratic nomination. Now Biden and his team want to clarify the choice voters will face, believing that the stakes of the election, and Trump’s solidifying grip on the GOP, will appeal to voters in the center and reinvigorate his base.

While many in the country have hoped for different choices in November, Biden decidedly is not one of them. He sees a rematch with Trump as both his easiest path to reelection and a validation of his decision, at 81, to seek another four-year term.

Biden wasted no time trying to anoint Trump as his head-on rival after the Republican’s decisive victory in the New Hampshire primary, which came on the heels of a romp in the Iowa caucuses a week earlier.

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