In a surprisingly blunt, 11th hour confession, lame duck president Joe Biden has admitted that he might not have lasted a second term if he had somehow won re-election - vindicating what Donald Trump has long said about Biden's mental fitness.
"Who the hell knows?" Biden told USAToday in an exit interview, when asked if he would have served another four years.
While admitting he may not have been up to another four years, Biden is clinging to the conviction that - if he had not dropped out - he would have beaten Trump at the ballot box.
"When Trump was running again for re-election, I really thought I had the best chance of beating him," Biden said in the interview.
"But I also wasn't looking to be president when I was 85 years old, 86 years old," Biden added.
With Biden heading for the exits, insiders are dishing to the Wall Street Journal and others about an elaborate White House cover-up of Biden's limitations - confirming what many long suspected about the president.
The public repeatedly expressed concerns about Biden's cognitive decline throughout his term, but the issue was ignored by Democrats and most liberal media until his feeble performance at a pivotal CNN debate in June, which convinced Democrats - including Nancy Pelosi - he could not defeat Trump.
Biden's support collapsed overnight, and he put up a stubborn fight with his own party before dropping his re-election bid. Trump went on to win the presidency in a historic political comeback, defeating vice president Kamala Harris resoundingly.
Democrats, including Pelosi, have blamed Harris' defeat on Biden's refusal to step aside sooner.
Biden has been largely overshadowed since he ended his campaign, with the world's attention turned to President-elect Trump and his bold plans for a second term - from mass deportations to purchasing Greenland.
While Biden has been mostly forgotten about already, he has continued to provoke public criticism with a series of controversial moves, many of them aimed at undermining his successor.
Like he has done in the past, Biden maintained in his exit interview that his age has given him wisdom in dealing with world affairs - an assessment many are sure to disagree with.
"And so I hope that history says that I came in and I had a plan how to restore the economy and reestablish America's leadership in the world," he said. "That was my hope."
