Why Biden is making ‘freedom’ a central campaign focus: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the campaign trail, the White House and Capitol Hill.

In today's edition, Mike Memoli and Ghael Fobes, who cover the ins and outs of Joe Biden's White House and campaign, report on how "freedom" has become a key pillar of the president's re-election effort. And stay tuned for a special post-State of the Union edition of From the Politics Desk tonight.

Biden seeks to refresh FDR’s ‘Four Freedoms’ for 2024

By Mike Memoli and Ghael Fobes

When President Joe Biden launched his re-election campaign last April, the first word he uttered was “Freedom.”

It’s a theme that will not only be a key pillar of his State of the Union address tonight, but of his re-election bid going forward as he turns his attention to a rematch with Donald Trump.

The Biden team’s focus on freedom and threats to democracy as a defining electoral issue has often invited criticism from allies, at a time when Americans’ perceptions of the economy, and of the 81-year-old president himself, are also expected to dominate the months ahead.

Do you have a news tip? Let us know

Advisers understand the importance of Biden’s delivery in answering questions about his age, and agree on the need to help better connect the administration’s economic agenda and accomplishments to the improvements in voters’ everyday lives.

But none of that will matter, aides counter, if America’s democracy falters, a reality the president will starkly warn is possible, and one his advisers say voters have already responded to.

Biden plans to invoke Franklin Roosevelt’s 1941 address to Congress, which became known as the “Four