As a 2020 presidential candidate, Joe Biden said he would work with allies "to advance our shared objective of a denuclearized North Korea."

Experts say that the Biden administration pursued security negotiations with North Korea early on in his tenure, but North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un, rebuffed those entreaties, leaving the two nations likely further apart on achieving denuclearization today than they were when Biden took office in 2021. 

In 2021, U.S., Japanese and South Korean diplomats held periodic meetings, and Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed North Korea late that year. But none of these talks produced major announcements. 

"The Biden administration took office almost four years ago determined to keep the door open to dialogue with North Korea, strengthen coordination with allies and partners to ensure a common approach on North Korea, and keep alliances strong in the face of a rising threat from an intransigent North Korean regime," said Evans Revere, a senior adviser at the Albright Stonebridge Group, a foreign policy consulting firm. "It has done exactly that."

However, the U.S. outreach was not reciprocated. In a sign that nuclear negotiations were not on his agenda, Kim has repeatedly tested ballistic missiles. In 2022, he launched a record 42 ballistic missiles, followed by 21 in 2023 and 37 in 2024.

"If we have learned nothing else about North Korea since the collapse of the Donald Trump-Kim Jong Un summit in Hanoi in 2019, it is that Kim Jong Un's regime is determined to keep its nuclear weapons program, prevent the U.S and the international community from freezing or limiting that program, and expand that nuclear weapons program to new levels," Revere said.

Stephan Haggard, a research professor and former director of the University of California-San Diego's Korea-Pacific Program, agreed that the Biden administration offered an opening to Kim that was never reciprocated. 

"I doubt whether there was any offer that was politically feasible in the U.S. that would have changed North Korea's views," Haggard said.

In the second half of Biden's term, the U.S. intensified its cooperation with its allies Japan and South Korea, including a trilateral summit in 2023, Haggard said. The summit offered evidence of the United States' "continued commitment to extended deterrence," he added.

The U.S. showed unity with South Korea when it sent a nuclear-armed submarine to the region in 2023.

In contrast, U.S. cooperation with China and Russia, the other major players in the region, has continued to fray. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin's 2022 invasion of Ukraine has so strained its military that it was driven to trade food for North Korean munitions, according to South Korea's defense minister. More than 10,000 North Korean soldiers are now in Russia to help it repel Ukrainian forces from Russian territory. Both developments pointed to a strengthening of Russia's strategic alliance with North Korea, counter to the Biden administration's objective.

As for China, it is on record calling for denuclearization of North Korea. But the Council on Foreign Relations, a foreign policy think tank, has written that the nation "ignores requests from the United States and allies to use its leverage on North Korea," such as its economic ties, "to push for denuclearization."

"The prospect of policy coordination has dwindled given that U.S.-China relations remain fraught," the council wrote.

Overall, the conflict between North Korea and the West "has escalated," said Robert S. Ross, a political scientist at Boston College and an associate at Harvard University's Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies.

As a candidate, Biden did not promise to complete a denuclearization of North Korea; he pledged to negotiate toward that goal. And as president, his administration made efforts to engage North Korea and increased ties with U.S. allies such as Japan and South Korea to help achieve results.

However, experts say a combination of North Korea intransigence and U.S. friction with Russia and China has likely left denuclearization further away. 

On balance, we rate this a Compromise.

As a presidential candidate, Joe Biden said he would "jump start" a coordinated campaign with allies and China toward denuclearization in North Korea.

So far, the campaign has been more like a stroll than a leap forward.

There have been periodic meetings involving U.S., Japanese and South Korean diplomats. The most recent took place in late October. But these talks have produced no major announcements. Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping brought up North Korea when they spoke in November, and nothing specific emerged.

Bonnie Jenkins, U.S. undersecretary for arms control, said at a September NATO meeting that the U.S. is "taking a practical approach that is open to diplomacy with North Korea," and meanwhile, U.S. sanctions will continue.

Shortly after that meeting, North Korea tested two ballistic missiles, launching them into international waters between Japan and the Korean Peninsula

The latest U.S. intelligence threat assessment said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un sees nuclear weapons as "the ultimate deterrent against foreign intervention."

"He probably does not view the current level of pressure on his regime as enough to require a fundamental change in its approach," the April report said.

With no specific progress in engaging North Korea's nuclear program, we rate this promise Stalled.