The motorcade weaved through Baltimore streets, red and blue lights flashing. President Joe Biden had just delivered an October speech touting port improvements, but now, arriving at a family-owned Canton ice cream shop painted in pastel colors, his expression softened.

“Hey man!” he shouted to a customer. “Nice to see you guys.”

Biden, 82, whose term ends Jan. 20, has long had an affinity for Baltimore, an unpretentious city with an industrial past like his native Scranton, Pennsylvania.

At his best, the outgoing president forged deals with Congress addressing problems — aging bridges and tunnels, prescription drug costs straining seniors’ budgets — afflicting Baltimore and communities around the country. He helped steer the country through the COVID pandemic with empathy and an economic stimulus, and he signed an infrastructure rebuilding package that included funds to replace an ancient Baltimore rail tunnel that Biden made into a symbol of his “Investing in America” agenda.

But Biden’s legacy is clouded by a halting debate performance in June prompting questions about his age and cognitive abilities that led him — too late to suit many in his party — to withdraw from a presidential campaign won in November by Republican Donald Trump.

The Democrat’s poll numbers plummeted to historically low levels as Republicans accused Biden of overstimulating the economy with his $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan of 2021, and voters blamed him for driving up prices. The administration had made a calculation — as business and government revenues plunged during the pandemic — that it needed a resounding response.

“At the time, we often said that the risks of doing too little were greater than the risks of doing too much,” Jared Bernstein, chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, told The Baltimore Sun on Thursday. “And by that, we meant there were a lot of families and businesses that needed to get to the other side of this crisis, and the rescue plan was designed to hit back hard against a pandemic economics that was still rearing its head dramatically.”

Trump said during last year’s campaign against Vice President Kamala Harris that Biden and Harris oversaw “the worst inflation in American history.” That claim is incorrect, but economists widely agree that the rescue plan “put too much money in Americans’ pockets,” allowing prices to spike as demand outstripped supply, according to PolitiFact, the Florida-based fact-checking site.

The Biden administration has acknowledged that its stimulus spending may have contributed to inflation, but it has also said that other factors, including supply chain issues, were in play.

State and local governments were sustaining deep revenue losses at the time due to declining spending by residents and tourists, as well as the expense of medical supplies and other resources related to the pandemic.

The 2021 rescue plan sent many Americans direct payments, extended a $300 weekly unemployment supplemental benefit and provided new support for restaurants and other small business.

“Any stimulus that’s worth its salt is going to create some growth,” Bernstein said. “And that was very much part of our expectation. Neither we nor others foresaw the invasion of Ukraine and its impact on gas prices and food prices, and obviously that exacerbated price pressures,” he said.

Political analysts — and the administration itself — point to a disconnect between Biden’s achievements and his standing with Americans, many of whom seem to have turned the page on him long before his presidency ended.

“Given that he had a very narrow majority in the Senate, what he was able to accomplish and what he did legislatively is substantial,” said St. Mary’s College political science professor Todd Eberly. Eberly cited prescription drug reform, environmental protection, climate change mitigation, infrastructure funding and a push to diversify the federal judiciary.

Biden succeeded with lawmakers because of his general decency and because he had been one of them — a Delaware senator for 36 years — and then vice president, said former Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin, whose final term ended on Jan. 3.

“I have worked with many presidents and President Biden is the only president I call by his first name, and that speaks volumes,” said Cardin, 81, a Democrat. “He doesn’t want to take advantage of his title in a conversation, and that’s unique for a president and means you’re going to have a much more genuine conversation.”

But the June debate with Trump imprinted on viewers a disquieting image of an unsteady president speaking softly and, at times, unintelligibly.

Questions that had long swirled about his age and decision to seek reelection descended on him. Trump repeatedly attacked Biden during the debate over the economy and issues at the southern border.

“When Joe Biden ran (in 2020), he never committed himself to a single term, and I understand why because he would have basically made himself a lame duck on Day One,” Eberly said. “But he certainly used the language of him being a transition candidate — a bridge between generations — and the implication was that it would be one term.”

But Biden had overcome serious personal and political obstacles before and believed that, despite fading polling numbers, he could beat Trump again in 2024. A car crash had killed Biden’s first wife and their baby daughter in 1972. In 1987, he exited the presidential race after allegations that he had lifted remarks from a British politician without attribution. He had been all but counted out early in the 2020 race before securing the Democratic nomination.

As Biden lingered in the 2024 race, “I had conversations with him, and he thought he was the only person who could beat President Trump’s reelection. He really believed that,” Cardin said.

According to Cardin, Biden thought Trump could take advantage of a divisive Democratic primary to score political points.

Many national Democratic leaders believe the opposite: that Biden could have toned down any pride preventing him from withdrawing early enough to allow the ultimate nominee — Harris or another candidate — to better introduce themselves to voters.

Biden withdrew on July 21, endorsing Harris. “I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term,” his announcement said.

“We’ll never know,” Cardin said, “if he would have made the decision earlier, would we have had a competitive primary and who would have been the next president? That’s going to always be a question mark.”

Efforts to interview Biden were unsuccessful.

To Baltimore, Biden’s legacy will prominently include his commitment that the federal government pay the full cost of rebuilding the Francis Scott Key Bridge that collapsed in March after being struck by a container ship, killing six construction workers.

Years ago, Biden’s father and grandparents lived in Charles Village, a fact Biden imparted to a Baltimore Sun reporter during a White House reception.

“I’ve got family from Baltimore,” Biden said. “They call it Bal-mer, right?” he said, doing his best to strike a Baltimore accent.

“I think he has a particular soft spot for Baltimore,” Bernstein said.

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