NEW YORK — Former President Joe Biden’s memoir will be published Nov. 17, Little, Brown and Company confirmed to The Associated Press. Its release, coming two weeks after midterm elections in which Democrats are trying to win back control of Congress, could create political unease inside the party by returning Biden to the national spotlight at a sensitive moment.
Biden’s legacy remains a source of debate among Democrats. Some in the party fault his ultimately unsuccessful push to seek another term for helping pave the way for Republican President Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Democratic leaders would prefer to keep the fall campaign centered on Trump and his record, and any pre-election excerpts, leaks or promotional appearances tied to the book could prove unwelcome.
“‘Promise Me, America’ is about the challenges we faced as a nation. It’s about the decisions I made and why I made them,” Biden said in a video statement released with Wednesday’s announcement. “It’s about why I chose to run for reelection and why I chose to step aside.”
Speculation about a Biden memoir has been circulating for more than a year. The former president has also mentioned the project in public remarks, at one point appearing to indicate that it might arrive before November’s election.
Biden, who will turn 84 three days after “Promise Me, America” is released, has often cast himself as a defender of presidential norms and traditions — and writing a post-White House memoir is one of them. With only a few exceptions, modern presidents since Harry Truman in the 1950s have published accounts of their time in office. Like nearly all of those predecessors, Biden had assistance, with Little, Brown saying he worked with a “small editorial team.” The publisher declined to disclose the financial terms of the deal, though presidential memoir agreements have typically been worth at least seven figures.
The title recalls Biden’s 2017 memoir, “Promise Me, Dad,” a deeply personal book focused on the death of his son Beau Biden.
Biden entered the presidency promising to “restore the soul” of the country, taking office during the COVID-19 pandemic and shortly after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters trying to block certification of his victory. His administration was shaped by major crises and legislative accomplishments, including the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and the passage of sweeping infrastructure and economic relief measures. But many readers are likely to look for new details about his health in office, especially surrounding his troubled June 2024 debate against Trump, which preceded his decision to abandon his reelection campaign. Then-Vice President Kamala Harris replaced him as the Democratic nominee and lost decisively to Trump.
Former first lady Jill Biden wrote in her own book that her husband appeared so frail and disoriented during the debate that she worried he might be having a stroke. In “View from the East Wing,” published in June, she also noted that the White House initially described his condition as a cold.
“The biggest lesson for us, I think, was that if you don’t explain something well enough then the question won’t go away,” she wrote. “There was never a satisfying enough explanation offered for Joe’s debate performance, and a lot of people never got over it.”
Biden was the oldest man to serve as president and his health was a source of speculation for much of his term; Biden and his White House advisers have faced intense criticism from Democrats and Republicans for allegedly concealing the extent of his problems. A notable book release from 2025, Jake Tapper’s and Alex Thompson’s “Original Sin,” was subtitled “President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again.”
That year, Biden announced he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer.
Biden’s previous books also include “Promises to Keep,” a campaign work published to boost his run for president in 2008, when Barack Obama was the eventual nominee and Biden his running mate. “Promise Me, America” comes out during a year when nonfiction sales have declined and few political books have caught on, although recent bestsellers have included Vice President JD Vance’s “Communion” and an inside account of Trump’s second term, by New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, “Regime Change.”
A Little, Brown spokesperson said that Biden plans to tour on behalf of the book and give interviews. In his video announcement, Biden said that many people had been asking him how he was doing.
“I’ve been spending a lot of time with my family. I’m dealing with a cancer diagnosis, been getting treatment, and it’s going really well,” he said. “I want to thank all those who have offered their prayers and support and well-wishes. It’s meant the world to me and to Jill.”
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