President Joe Biden has announced he will seek re-election, making the declaration in a video highlighting the threat to democracy from his predecessor, Donald Trump. Biden argued that the fight against the erosion of democracy had been the work of his first term but was unfinished while Trump and his supporters posed a significant threat to fundamental rights. The president accused “MAGA extremists” of endangering bedrock freedoms, citing issues such as social security cuts, tax breaks for the wealthy, women’s healthcare, restrictions on book sales and the right to love, and voter suppression. Biden is now the oldest US president in history and would be 86 at the end of a second term if he were to win again. Despite skepticism about his age and electability, he overcame such doubts to defeat Trump in 2020. His re-election campaign comes in an era of severe political polarization and is likely to be limited to a small number of fiercely contested swing states.