President Joe Biden is the "most tragic figure in modern American politics," and Democrats could have kept the White House if he had decided last year not to seek reelection, said Democrat strategist James Carville.
Further, Carville said in the latest episode of his podcast, "Politics War Room" for Politicon, the president would never have had to pardon his son, Hunter, if he'd agreed not to run again.
"If he would have in September of 2023 or August said that he wasn't going to run … we would have won this election," Carville commented. "It wouldn't have been that close because we would have had so many frickin' talented people that were running, and he would be sitting here right now getting ready to leave on a high note."
And instead of being regarded as tragic, Biden would have been the "toast of Washington," said Carville.
"They would be naming commissions to figure out what are we going to name after him," said Carville. "It would be a Democratic inauguration coming up, and a new Democratic president could have gotten away with commuting any sentence that Hunter Biden got."
But instead, Biden promised that he'd never pardon his son, which Carville said he didn't believe.
"When anybody says, 'I never had sex with that person,' or 'I won't pardon my kid,' I don't pay any attention to it because I think everybody lies about sex, and everybody's going to do whatever they're going to do with their own children," said Carville.
Still, had Biden dropped out, there may have been some pushback if his successor pardoned Hunter, but the fallout "would have been minimal," he said.
"There would have been some pushback, but, you know, in the interest of the Biden family and President Biden's long and distinguished service to the community," the sentence would have been commuted, he said.
Carville didn't fully blame Biden for Vice President Kamala Harris' loss to President-elect Donald Trump and has in the past criticized how her campaign had been run.
"It didn't have to be this way," said Carville, calling Biden's political wounds "self-inflicted."
"I actually feel for Biden, and he knows that he f***ed up," said Carville. "He wasn't crooked, he didn't pursue bad policies; he is the most tolerant, loving, caring, non-prejudiced person you could imagine, and this is what he's faced with."