In a speech to the nation Sunday night from St. Croix, where he is spending his final New Year’s as president, President Joe Biden lamented the passing of former President Jimmy Carter.
Carter passed away on Sunday at the age of 100, only months after becoming the first American president to do so. Since February 2023, he had been receiving hospice care in his Plains, Georgia, home.
Biden claimed that he and his wife, first lady Jill Biden, had lost a close friend and referred to Carter as a statesman and humanitarian.
Biden praised the former president’s character and claimed to be the first national figure to support Carter during his 1976 presidential campaign. Decency, decency, and Carter’s conviction that everyone should have a chance were the main themes of Biden’s recollections of Carter.
Can you picture Jimmy Carter passing someone in need and continuing to walk? Can you think of using someone’s appearance or speech to describe them? “I am unable to,” Biden remarked.
Biden, who lost his son Beau to brain cancer in 2015, claimed that the two leaders had become closer as a result of the illness. After surviving a cancer diagnosis in 2015, Carter gave cancer patients new hope and introduced immunotherapy to the globe.
According to Biden, Jimmy Carter’s fight against cancer was as brave as everything else throughout his life.
Biden recounted Carter’s assistance to his family following the death of his son.
Beau, our son, passed away. Jimmy and Rosalynn were there to support us throughout his death. Jimmy was too familiar with the disease’s devastation. This horrible illness claimed the lives of his father, brother, and sister. Biden added that the two leaders thought the United States could eradicate cancer as we know it if it made the necessary investments. “So, when Jimmy was diagnosed, we did our best to comfort him,” he said.
Biden also recalled Carter’s marriage to his 77-year wife, Rosalynn. died on November 19, 2023, at the age of 96.
Theirs is a timeless love affair. Both of them will be sorely missed. As our children say, I do find some comfort in the fact that they are reunited. “They’re together again, but they’ll always be in our hearts,” Biden remarked.
Lawmakers from both parties lamented Carter’s passing on Sunday, along with the four surviving past US presidents. World leaders also offered their condolences to Carter, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in mediating the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel.
However, what I find remarkable about Jimmy Carter is that, despite never having met him, millions of people worldwide feel as though they lost a friend as well. According to Biden, this is because Jimmy Carter’s life was evaluated by his actions rather than his words.
Carter’s compassion and moral clarity, Biden recalled, lifted people up and impacted lives all throughout the world during his time as president and after his departure.
Take a look at his life and his work. He sought to end illness globally as well as domestically. Around the world, he fostered peace, encouraged free and fair elections, and championed human rights and civil liberties. According to Biden, he constructed homes and housing for the homeless.
It was the second time Biden has honored Carter this year.He called Carter a moral force for our country and the world in a video message on CBS in September, just before his 100th birthday.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Carter, a prospective fellow one-term president, was unable to attend Biden’s inauguration in 2021.
“We sat and talked about the old days,” Biden said when the Bidens visited the Carters in Georgia later that year.
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