Joe Biden reveals how he hopes Trump's presidency will go down in history

Mr Biden says he hasn't decided yet on whether we should run for president in 2020

Former Vice President of the US, Joe Biden (Photo by Craig Barritt/Getty Images for Glamour) (Getty Images for Glamour)

Former Vice President Joe Biden has said he hopes Donald Trump’s behaviour as President will be an outlier in American history.

Speaking to host Stephen Colbert on The Late Show, Mr Biden said he initially vowed to give Mr Trump an “even shot” after the election – but that the President’s response to a deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville forced him to change his perspective.

“Charlottesville for me was a moment where I thought silence would be complicity,” Mr Biden said, referring to Mr Trump's delayed, controversial response to the neo-Nazi violence in Virginia that left one dead and 19 injured.

Mr Bided noted that there are certain things “you just can't remain silent” about.

“To not have an outright, flat condemnation of that…I thought the silence was deafening,” Mr Biden added.

The former Democratic vice president under Barack Obama said the events in Charlottesville triggered him to speak out against racism.

In August, white supremacist demonstrators descended on Charlottesville to protest the removal of a statue of Confederate General Robert E Lee. The rally, met by counter-protests, quickly became violent.

Mr Trump received widespread criticism for insisting that white supremacists and neo-Nazis and did not deserve 100 per cent of the blame for what happened. He was also condemned for appearing to defend the hate groups when he said, “You also had some very fine people on both sides.”

When asked how Mr Trump's un-presidential behaviour will influence future presidents, Mr Biden dryly replied: “I think it will, God willing, go down as the single exception in American history.”

“I mean, I just think there's an attack on the system, and I think people are worried, and by the way, and it goes beyond President Trump, in my view,” he added.

Mr Biden, who is currently promoting his new book, “Promise Me, Dad”, declined to say if he would consider running for president in 2020.

“I want to focus on Beau and my grandkids. We'll see where it goes,” he said, referring to his son who died of brain cancer in 2015.

On Monday, he said he hadn't decided yet on whether to run.

“I'm not closing the door. I've been around too long,” he said during an interview with NBC’s Today show. “I'm a great respecter of fate.”

“But who knows what the situation is going to be a year and a half from now? I don't have any idea,” he added.