WASHINGTON _ No, Joe Biden didn't just announce a presidential run in 2020. But as he's learned from experience, you never say never.
"I'm not committing not to run. I'm not committed to anything," the vice president told reporters at the Capitol on Monday night after attending a Senate vote. "I learned a long time ago _ fate has a strange way of intervening."
Biden might have run this year if not for fate intervening. He seriously weighed a candidacy in 2015 as he and his family grieved the death of his eldest son, Beau, who had brain cancer.
"The (grief) process doesn't respect or much care about things like filing deadlines or debates and primaries and caucuses," he said last year as he announced he would not run, saying he didn't have enough time to mount a winning campaign.
But in that same speech, he rededicated himself to public service. Among the causes he pledged to champion was a cure for cancer.
Which is why Biden was even talking to reporters Monday at the Capitol. In his constitutional role as president of the Senate, he presided over consideration of legislation that includes $1.8 billion in funding for cancer research.
Before senators approved the measure, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., announced a last-minute amendment: to rename the cancer funding provisions in honor of Beau Biden.
"It's fitting to dedicate this bill's critical cancer initiatives in honor of someone who'd be proud of the presiding officer today, and that's his son," McConnell said as Biden watched, clearly moved. The vice president silently clasped his hands in front of him after the final change was approved, and the chamber applauded in his honor.
Shortly after, Biden was asked about running for president in four years. "Yeah, I am. I am going to run in 2020," he said. Asked whether he was serious, Biden paused, before acknowledging the role of fate.
It will be an emotional few weeks for Biden as he prepares to leave office. On Wednesday, he'll return to the Senate for a bipartisan tribute to his 36 years as a member of the body, as well as eight as vice president.
On Dec. 18, his family will again mark another tragic anniversary: of the car accident that killed his first wife and infant daughter just after Biden won his first term in the Senate in 1972.
