But hobbled by inflation, illegal immigration and his own advancing age, Mr. Biden leaves office as an unpopular one-term president, turning over the Oval Office to a man he considers a fascist and a danger to democracy. He hopes that history will remember him more fondly than his contemporaries do and, as with other presidents, it just well might.

U.S. President Joe Biden answers questions from the media at a briefing on the federal response to the wildfires across Los Angeles, in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, U.S., January 10,

President Joe Biden capped a half-century political career on Wednesday with a final Oval Office speech as he hopes to seal a legacy overshadowed by Democrats' failure to stop Donald Trump from returning to the White House.