The Case Against Biden 2024
By: Andrew Yuan ‘24
Sorry, Joe, but incompetence is not a synonym for unity.
Joe Biden ran on a platform for bipartisan unity. As much as his presidential campaign and early presidency showcased impressive endorsements from top Republican figures, America remained divided in polarizing politics and we were nowhere closer to bipartisanship as we were during the early days of the Trump administration.
Biden promised to build a stronger coalition with NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and Pacific allies as an antidote against Trump’s outspoken criticism of other free world leaders. Yet, as the former chairman/ranking member of Senate Foreign Relations Committee for 12 years, Biden’s Afghanistan withdrawal showcased weaknesses of the American military and continues to leave the Middle East in a neverending power vacuum.
In the present state of his failing presidency, Biden deserves an approval rating on par with that of Donald Trump. And if the Democrats wish to mitigate the overwhelming loss they will soon face in the midterms or in the upcoming presidential election, it’s time to make Biden a one-term president.
Young Voters
The Biden presidency shares some fatal similarities with the Trump administration that continue to haunt governmental efficiency. In 2020, voters thought that Biden would be a pragmatic president who works in the shadows. Instead, Biden is consistently running the White House like a reality TV show synonymous to that of “The Apprentice” with publicized gaffes and social media campaigns.
Ultimately, it comes down to Biden’s desperate appeal to young voters.
In the last few months, Biden has not only hosted a panel of TikTok stars to discuss messaging in the U.S.’s campaign against Ukraine, but also launched a nonprofit group dedicated to spreading Biden’s agenda on TikTok. In doing so, Biden has turned to liberal celebrities such as Billie Ellish, Olivia Rodrigo and Jonas Brothers to garner support from idol-centered teens while mixing political messages such as “get vaxxed” or “solidarity against Russia” in the celebrities’ White House promotions.
In the same way that Trump has garnered conservative support with his demeaning daily tweets, Biden is propagandizing his political stances in his overly visible Instagram Shorts and TikToks, accompanied by seemingly innocent and subtle celebrity photo-ops.
And let’s not forget, these young voters almost cost Biden’s presidential nomination in 2020 when they flocked to the growing progressive wing of Sanders and Warren, neither of which have explicitly ruled out a 2024 campaign against Biden.
So despite criticisms and caricatures from Republicans, Biden persists on with the social media campaign.
Unlike Trump, however, Biden’s campaign is not playing well among his audience. Most of the comments— from both young and elder users— under Biden’s TikTok and Instagram section characterized Biden’s social media posts as “cringy,” highly unnecessary during a time of crisis, or both. On the other hand, despite liberal outrage against most of the tweets, Trump’s chaotic social media updates solidified support from his Republican base on foreign policy and immigration stances.
Polls are telling of his meager support among young voters: Gallup’s survey shows a drastic drop of 20 percent in Biden’s approval rating among Millennials and Gen Z, from 59 percent to 39 percent. Quinnipiac provides a similar estimate of 58 percent disapproval against 21 percent approval.
Though Biden tries to build his image as a successor to Barack Obama, his public relationships strategy is telling a completely different story: a story about how a Democratic president who claims to be a “regular Joe” is boasting his extravagant Easter Holiday Bunny celebrations or White House Correspondents’ Dinner while young people continue to be disproportionately disempowered and discouraged through overwhelming student debts and soaring inflation.
How can one not despair when our president is celebrating his completion of one-tenth of his campaign promise? How can one not despair when our president’s responses to climate change and the Ukrainian crisis are social media posts with Tom Brady? How can one not despair when our president fails to deliver even a public condemnation or signs of disappointment when reproductive rights are in jeopardy? When Republican senators are even willing to say that the impending decision on Roe v. Wade “undermines my confidence in the court?”
Young people can see through his hypocrisy and it’s not one they would likely forgive in 2024.
Successor
If the Democrats were to nominate Biden in two years, he would be the first person over 80 to ever receive the presidential nomination of a major party. Biden is no longer representative of the Democratic Party anymore: he is simply an old white man clenching onto the presidency despite his incompetence. Regardless of Biden’s decision to run in 2024, the Democrats will eventually face the predicament of choosing a successor to Biden. Currently, Biden’s concentrated power dynamic in the White House is costing the future of a post-Biden Democratic coalition, leaving no apparent candidate who would be able to compete against Trump, Pence or even DeSantis.
Mocked by Republicans and centrist Democrats as the “Invisible Vice President,” Kamala Harris, according to various media sources, currently lacks an official role in the White House, while her top aides continue to leave the White House.
There is a reason behind Harris’s invisibility: Biden is asking her to resolve immigration and border disputes and pass voting rights legislation without even creating task forces with experts who could aid her in the first place.
We’ve had inexperienced vice presidents before and we’ve had equally inexperienced presidents before: Obama came to the White House with four years in the Senate too. Experience is not the excuse for inaction, but continued lack of assistance from experts and even Biden himself can explain Harris’s seeming invisibility.
I had great faith in Kamala Harris once: sure, her claims don’t necessarily match up with her actions, but hardly any politician could deliver all their promises. Adding onto her relatively young age, she seems to have an unstoppable political momentum and destined ascension to power: eight years as District Attorney, Attorney General of California for eight years, four years in the Senate and now the Vice President of the United States.
But as she becomes one of the only few choices to succeed Biden, Biden’s lack of coordination in the White House and continued ignorance of Harris is killing her political future.
Biden seems to suggest Pete Buttigieg as another viable successor: he is a young Cabinet member and the Build Back Better plan garnered attention around his role as the Secretary of Transportation.
Yet besides his grand plan to drastically improve American infrastructure (which may become either a political prize or an economic catastrophe), Buttigieg lacks any legislative or governing experience usually required by presidential nominees and his record as the mayor of South Bend continues to face renewed examination from liberals.
The other viable choices left are the progressive candidates and liberal centrists whose presidential runs in 2020 did not endure the scrutiny from the public or from their fellow competitors. The only viable choice for Democrats to find a compromising candidate is by breaking that Biden-centered bureaucracy in his own Cabinet and for his own Vice President.
As Eric Swalwell quoted Biden (who quoted John F. Kennedy) during a 2020 Democratic Presidential debate, “it’s time to pass the torch.”
In the past fall and winter terms, Exeter became an Exeter centered around Trump. Besides schoolwork and stress, it seems that students actively discussed politics as something tangible, as something they could one day change. Yet now as a president of a different party who branded himself as the healer of the nation continues to disappoint us, it’s time for a change that should have happened in 2020.
Make Joe Biden a one-term president.
