The ad, stitched together from Obama’s speech presenting Biden the Presidential Medal of Freedom before they left office together in January 2017, is part of Biden’s closing argument in the days leading up to the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 3. It’s a way to convince Democratic voters that they should put him in the Oval Office because Obama — the most popular figure in the party — put him a heartbeat away from it.

“This a very effective ad ... it is a clever way of signifying Obama’s feelings about Biden, implying an endorsement the president has not made,” said David Axelrod, a top Obama adviser.

“His testimonial from the Medal of Freedom speech goes to what are perhaps the most salient and appealing qualities of Biden: character, empathy, decency,” Axelrod continued. “Barack Obama is a highly esteemed figure in the Democratic Party and perhaps nowhere more than Iowa, which really embraced him and launched him to the presidency.”

Iowa has been a tough haul for Biden, who has quit two previous presidential campaigns after failing to catch fire there. But this time, Biden began as a frontrunner in the first-in-the-nation caucus state, and he is now locked in a four-way race for first place, according to the averages of recent polls in the state.

Knowing Obama wouldn’t endorse before a clear winner emerged in the crowded Democratic primary, Biden began the campaign saying he privately told Obama he didn’t want him to endorse anyway. Those who have spoken to Obama about Biden have issued conflicting accounts about whether Obama wanted him to run, with some saying the former president approved — especially because Biden is running on a platform of unabashedly furthering his legacy — to those who said Obama wasn’t enthusiastic.

One Democrat who is neutral in the 2020 race and spoke to Obama about Biden’s gaffe-prone nature recalled the former president saying: “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to fuck things up.”

An Obama spokesman said his team does not discuss private conversations — but raised no objections with the ad. A Biden adviser said Obama was made aware of the ad beforehand. The Biden campaign used a Medal of Freedom clip in a campaign announcement video last year, but that announcement video wasn’t solely based on Obama lavishing praise on Biden

Even without endorsing, Obama has been central to Biden’s standing in the presidential primary. Obama offered kind words praising Biden when he announced his 2020 campaign, and Biden’s role as Obama’s vice president has contributed to Biden’s crucial and outsized edge among black voters, which has kept him atop the primary polls for the last year. And when Biden’s campaign was hitting a low point, Biden leaned into his past with Obama.

Biden later said he didn’t need Obama’s endorsement to win — though he seldom misses a chance to call the former president by his first name to emphasize their personal friendship, a liberty none of the other dozen candidates can take.

The new ad’s release coincides with the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday and Biden’s ongoing efforts to consolidate the support of black voters. At the same time his campaign released this ad — which comes in 30-second and 60-second versions — it announced Biden’s 11th endorsement from a Congressional Black Caucus member: Rep. Terri Sewell, whose Alabama district is the home of the Civil Rights movement, stretching from Birmingham through Selma to Montgomery.

The use of a president’s speech and likeness to intimate an endorsement that hasn’t been made is nothing new in politics. In 2004, during Mel Martinez’s successful first bid for U.S. Senate in Florida, he used an excerpt of President George W. Bush announcing his selection as housing secretary. The ad was cut in such a way that it looked like an endorsement, prompting primary rival Bill McCollum to bitterly complain because of the crucial edge it gave Martinez.

In this primary, none of Biden’s opponents have raised objections.