The 6 Living US Presidents 2024
There are six living presidents including the most recent commander-in-chief, President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who is the oldest person ever elected president.
The other living Americans who have served as president are Donald Trump, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter. Their careers in the White House span more than four decades.
The record for the most living presidents and former presidents at one time is six. Prior to the inauguration of Joe Biden, there were only two such moments in modern history: 2017 and most of 2018, when the above presidents and George H.W. Bush were alive during the first two years of the Trump presidency, and between 2001 and 2004 when both Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford were still alive during the George W. Bush presidency.Â
Of the five living presidents, only Clinton and Obama have the distinction of entering the office in their 40s. Carter and the younger Bush entered the White House in their 50s. Trump was 70 when he became president in January of 2017, and Biden started his term in 2021 at the age of 78.
The last time a former president died was in November 2018, when the elder Bush died at age 94.
On March 21, 2019, Carter became the oldest living American president in history at 94 years and 172 days old. The elder Bush was 94 years and 171 days old when he died.
Joe Biden
Joe Biden, a Democrat and the former vice president to Barack Obama from 2009 to 2017, won election to the presidency in 2020, defeating incumbent Donald Trump. At the time of his election in November 2020, Biden was 77 years old, and he turned 78 between his election and inauguration, surpassing his predecessor as the oldest person ever elected to the presidency.
Donald Trump
President Donald Trump, a Republican, is serving his first term in the White House. He first won election in 2016 after defeating Democrat Hillary Clinton in what was widely portrayed as an upset.
Trump was 70 years old at the time of his inauguration, making him the oldest person to be elected to the highest office in the land. The second-oldest president was Ronald Reagan, who was 69 years old when he took office in 1981.
Trump’s relationship with his living predecessors was strained; each of the former presidents criticized Trump at one time or another because of his policies and what they have described as behavior that is “un-presidential.”
Barack Obama
Barack Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, served two terms in the White House. He first won election in 2008 and was re-elected in 2012. Obama was inaugurated president when he was 47 years old. He was 55 when he left office eight years later, in 2017.
George W. Bush
George W. Bush, a Republican from Texas, was the 43rd president of the United States. He is a member of the Bush political dynasty. Bush was born on July 6, 1946, in New Haven, Connecticut. He was 54 when he was sworn into his first of two terms in the White House in 2001. He was 62 when he left office eight years later, in 2009.
Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton, a Democrat from Arkansas, was the 42nd president of the United States. Clinton was born on Aug. 19, 1946, in Hope, Arkansas. He was 46 when he took the oath of office in 1993 for his first of two terms in the White House. Clinton was 54 when his second term expired in 2001.
Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter, a Democrat from Georgia, was the 39th president of the United States and is the oldest of the five living presidents. Carter was born on Oct. 1, 1924, in Plains, Georgia. He was 52-years-old when he took office in 1977, and 56 years old when he left the White House four years later, in 1981.
Carter was diagnosed with cancer of the liver and brain in 2015, at age 90. He initially believed he had only weeks to live. Speaking to reporters that year, he said:
