Key moments of Joe Biden's presidency

Mr Biden enjoyed high approval ratings in his first few months in office, with many Americans greeting the new administration as a return to normality after four years of Mr Trump's unpredictable leadership and the traumatising chaos of the pandemic. The honeymoon period imploded in August 2021, during the US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, when scenes of deadly chaos in Kabul smashed the image of quiet competency the new President had worked hard to project.

Mr Biden's approval numbers never quite recovered from the brutal political reckoning that followed the Taliban's return to Afghanistan, 20 years after they were toppled in a US-led invasion. Images of Afghans clambering on top of US military cargo planes in a desperate bid to flee Kabul, and the horrors of an ISIS attack outside the city's airport that killed at least 182 people, including 13 US troops, became the defining visuals for Mr Biden's first year in office.

Central to Mr Biden's political identity was his apparent compassion and empathy that stemmed from the loss of his first wife and a young daughter in an accident, and the later death of one of his adult sons to cancer. But his handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal and the US evacuation from Kabul, which he heralded as an “extraordinary success”, undermined this image.

“I was not going to extend this forever war and I was not extending a forever exit,” Mr Biden said at the end of the military evacuation from Kabul. “It was time to end this war.”

Historians will debate how much Mr Biden should be blamed for events that summer, or the extent that Mr Trump - who had earlier reached a deal with the Taliban - was responsible. Mr Trump's withdrawal agreement, critics say, amounted to a surrender that betrayed the Afghan people, its military and the government. Members of his coming second presidency have indicated that they might try to prosecute US generals and officials involved in the withdrawal, which would amount to ignoring the role the Republican leader played.

In a dramatic show of support, Mr Biden made a whirlwind trip to Israel on October 18, 2023 – just days after the Hamas-led attack – and delivered a decisive message to a key US regional ally: “You are not alone.” He pledged to ensure Israel’s military edge and to ask Congress for additional funds. He urged Israel to show restraint and also announced $100 million in humanitarian assistance for Palestinians in Gaza and in the occupied West Bank.

In many ways, that trip set the tone for Mr Biden’s policy towards Israel for the remainder of his time in office: providing Israel with weapons and political support, while trying to supply aid to the war’s victims.

At home, Mr Biden’s near-unconditional support for Israel, and his push against calls to press Israel for a ceasefire, ignited intense anger among Arab Americans – most of whom had voted for him in 2020. It also provoked a widespread protest movement among young people across US college campuses who erected tents and staged sit-ins. Many of them called the President “Genocide Joe”.

Mr Biden at times showed signs of displeasure with Israel’s handling of the war. In February, he said Israel’s response in Gaza had been “over the top” and in May, held up a single shipment of 2,000- pound bombs saying they shouldn't be used in civilian-dense areas. That month, his administration presented a ceasefire proposal and tried to push the sides to agree to it.

In October, his administration gave Israel a 30-day ultimatum to improve the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, including by enabling more deliveries of international aid. After the deadline elapsed, Mr Biden's administration said there were sufficient “improvements” in Gaza, despite reports by aid groups indicating the opposite.

After Kamala Harris lost the election to Donald Trump on November 5, some expected Mr Biden to change tack on Gaza, as he did on Ukraine. But no adjustment came. Instead, there was another US veto of a ceasefire resolution at the UN Security Council. Days later, he called the International Criminal Court’s issuance of arrest warrants against Israeli leaders over their conduct in the war “outrageous”.

Mr Biden used up significant capital to push through three major pieces of legislation as part of his domestic policy, the fruits of which he will not see while in office and the fates of which are uncertain.

Those three bills – the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the Chips Act and the bipartisan infrastructure bill – all came with enormous price tags and were meant to be the cornerstone of his domestic agenda.

The crown jewel of the three – the IRA – is aimed at tackling climate change and offers lucrative tax incentives on renewable energies in an effort to reduce US carbon emissions by 40 per cent by 2030.

In 2021, Mr Biden set a goal of 50 per cent of new passenger vehicles sold to have zero emissions by 2030 and signed an executive order directing federal agencies to make all purchases of light-duty vehicles zero-emission by 2027.

The more than 1.4 million EVs sold in the US in 2023 – including fully electric and plug-in hybrids – represented more than 9 per cent of all vehicle sales for the year. That is a more than 50 per cent increase on 2022.

In the immediate aftermath of Mr Trump’s electoral victory, the fate of these three bills face an uncertain future. Republicans have flirted with the idea of repealing some of the provisions in the IRA, while Mr Trump railed against the cost of the Chips Act on the campaign trail.

Now, the Biden administration is rushing to pour money into the plans before Mr Trump takes the oath of office. In the weeks after the president-elect's 2024 win, the Commerce department has awarded a $7.9 billion grant to Intel and a $6.6 billion contract to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company.

And in October, the EPA awarded roughly $3 billion to ports to invest in green equipment to help "Trump-proof" Mr Biden's legacy.

And the Biden administration will leave the coming Trump administration with $294 billion to award in projects, according to figures compiled by the Brookings Institution.

Mr Biden once proudly proclaimed the bill will usher in an “infrastructure decade”. Now, the remaining spending of the $1.2 trillion bill will come under Mr Trump's discretion in its final two years.

Mr Biden is responsible for signing into law the Pact Act, “the largest health care and benefit expansion” in the history of the Department of Veterans Affairs.

The act, passed by the Senate in August 2022, expanded healthcare eligibility to 9/11 combat veterans, including more than 3.5 million veterans exposed to toxic substances. It also added 23 burn pit and toxic exposure-related conditions to the department's list of service presumptions.

Signing the bill into law was personal for Mr Biden, who lost his son Beau to cancer after he had served overseas.

But that long-lobbied-for point of progress in the battle for better care for veterans – 17 die a day by suicide – faced a stumbling block with Mr Biden's withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Many veterans of that 20-year conflict were left feeling that their service was “for nothing” after the Taliban's swift takeover in Kabul. That is the demographic of soldiers most likely to face mental health issues on their return home.

The post-9/11 years saw veteran suicide rates skyrocket by an average of 47 more deaths per year between 2001 and 2018. Younger veterans returning from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and other conflicts from America's Global War on Terrorism bore the brunt of that increase, with the suicide rate among soldiers aged 18 to 34 rising by 95.3 per cent.