Former president Joe Biden has used the first excerpt from his White House memoir to deliver his sharpest verdict yet on Donald Trump, saying the January 6 attack on the US Capitol “should follow him to his grave”.
In “Promise Me, America”, Biden writes that Trump “led an insurrection” on the day Congress met to certify the 2020 election, and that his goal was to remain in power after voters had removed him from office. The excerpt was published on Monday by The Atlantic, a week before the full memoir goes on sale on 17 November.
“The rioters weren’t ‘peaceful protesters,'” Biden wrote. “They came armed to stop the official certification of a legitimate election.” He also criticised Trump for issuing more than 1,500 pardons to people convicted over the attack on his first day back in office.
Biden reserved particular scorn for Trump’s claim to stand with law enforcement. “You don’t get to turn a blind eye to cops being punched, speared, sprayed, and brutalized and call yourself a friend of law enforcement,” he wrote. “What Trump did on January 6, 2021, should never be forgotten. It should follow him to his grave.”
The memoir also looks back at the transition between the two men. Biden recounts a nearly two-hour Oval Office meeting in November 2024, eight days after Trump defeated Kamala Harris, in which the president-elect told him: “You know, Joe, if it weren’t for politics, I believe we’d be good friends.” Biden wrote that he was too stunned to respond, and that Trump added he had been relieved not to have to run against him.
Biden said he used the meeting to give Trump “a tour of the world”, covering the war in Ukraine, NATO, Israel and Gaza, and relations with China — but that Trump “focused on the personalities” of world leaders rather than the substance. The encounter, he wrote, left him worried that Trump would dismantle much of his presidency, a fear he says the opening weeks of the second term confirmed.
The former president also laments what he calls the “dismissive and destructive” character of the new administration, singling out the Department of Government Efficiency and the reversal of his climate policies. “All presidents must confront a feeling that their legacy is vulnerable to the pendulum of politics and the whims of their successors,” he wrote. “In my case, that feeling was magnified by the dismissive and destructive nature of Donald Trump, who seemed unable to tolerate the idea that someone else’s accomplishments might be worth building on rather than tearing down.”
The book’s title echoes “Promise Me, Dad”, Biden’s 2017 memoir about his late son Beau. Biden waited until after last week’s midterm elections — in which Democrats won control of both chambers of Congress — to publish, and has said his activities promoting the book will be limited because of his health. He announced earlier this year that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer, and said on Sunday that doctors “continue to be encouraged by how I’ve responded to treatment”, though “some days are better than others”.
Sources: Associated Press, “Joe Biden, in White House memoir, says Trump should carry the weight of Jan. 6 riots ‘to his grave'” — https://www.kxl.com/joe-biden-in-white-house-memoir-says-trump-should-carry-the-weight-of-jan-6-riots-to-his-grave-2/ ; The Atlantic, first excerpt from “Promise Me, America”, published 9 November 2026.
