how Biden can turn the corner… and beat Trump – L’Express

It was to be a presidency focused on the United States, focused on post-Covid recovery, refocused on national priorities. But just like George W. Bush after September 11, 2001, Joe Biden was overtaken by History; and his mandate, transformed by the war in Ukraine, the conflict between Israel and Hamas, the shooting of the Houthis in the Red Sea and the American soldiers killed on January 28 in Jordan (by a drone of the Islamic Resistance movement in Iraq, financed by the ‘Iran). Two and a half years ago, international affairs had disrupted his presidency from the start, with the withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021, which caused Biden to plunge in the polls. A plunge of no return. Since this episode, considered a humiliating fiasco by his compatriots, the head of state has never returned to unpopularity. Today, the icing on the cake, the migrant crisis at the Mexican border – with daily records of human smuggling – is added to this dark picture.

Ten months before a presidential election that Donald Trump could win, the whole world is wondering if President Joe Biden, 81, is really the man for the job. Since November, polls have shown him losing in seven “swing States” (the key states), which will decide the outcome of the vote. So the question is: would another Democratic candidate have done the job better? “The president has two weaknesses that neither he nor anyone can do anything about,” said political consultant Whit Ayres in Washington. “The first is that the vast majority of Americans think he is too old to do this job. , which is undoubtedly the most complicated in the world. If he is elected, Biden will in fact be 82 years old at the start of his mandate and 86 at the end. Obviously, this is not the age group in which we are the freshest mentally and physically,” says Whit Ayres.

“The second,” he continues, “is that no one thinks Kamala Harris capable of occupying the presidential office. She has been singularly unimpressive as vice-president. But on the ‘electoral ticket’ in the company of the octogenarian Biden, the probability that she will replace him during his mandate is considerable. Certainly, in the election to the highest office, the personality of No. 2 is secondary and does not generally come into play in the choice of voters. But while he cannot claim to have the ability to win an election, a vice-presidential candidate can lose it. This is what happened to Republican John McCain in 2008, after choosing Sarah Palin, who was unanimously considered incompetent.

Get rid of Kamala Harris? “It is already very late for such a maneuver, especially since it would deprive Biden of part of the support of African-Americans who would not appreciate such a signal,” notes the historian of the United States Françoise Coste. In New York, conservative analyst Heather Mac Donald, of the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, tackles: “All this proves that choosing a vice-president on the basis of her gender and color carries risks,” explains this intellectual. “anti-woke”. “The only reason for her promotion to her position,” she continues, “is that she is black and she is a woman. But she is not suited to the position, does not know how to formulate political ideas. complex and, last but not least, his personality is unpleasant. This is how the Democratic Party finds itself a prisoner of woke thinking, because, according to their criteria, getting rid of her because she is incompetent would amount to racism…” adds the one who very moderately appreciates Trump – “I would have liked that Ron DeSantis is the candidate,” she said.

Biden thought Trump would disappear from the landscape

Faced with Trump, who dominates his camp’s primaries ahead of Nikki Haley, the Biden-Harris “ticket” seems fragile. Not only does Biden probably not have the physical strength to lead a grueling electoral campaign (in 2020, he was confined to his house transformed into an HQ), but, moreover, Kamala Harris does not arouse enthusiasm. The proof ? A growing fraction of the black electorate (nearly 20%) says they are ready to vote for Trump! A question arises: why did Biden run again, when he had suggested that he would be satisfied with just one term? The answer is simple: in 2020, Joe Biden thought that, once defeated, Trump would disappear from the political landscape. This was to underestimate the latter’s revanchism. Today, Biden considers himself best placed to beat the New York billionaire again. Not necessarily out of vanity. But because he judges that a first-time Democratic candidate – for example, the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, or the governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, both more to the left than Biden – would be pulverized by Trump.

Surprisingly, Joe Biden’s inner circle apparently has high morale. “They remain confident because their camp defeated Trump in 2018 [élections de mi-mandat]2020 [présidentielle] and 2022 [mi-mandat]”, explains, in Washington, Jacob Heilbrunn, who is publishing these days America Last, a book that studies the American right’s fascination with European dictators, from William II to Orban, including Mussolini and Putin. “The reasons that led to these victories have not changed: Trump does not unite Americans. Furthermore, Biden’s economic results are excellent, even if Americans still have not noticed it, because food prices have not yet decreased.” Biden is unpopular? “But Trump too! insists Jacob Heilbrunn. Beyond his many fans, he cannot convince independent voters, moderate Republicans and women from urban peripheries.”

Another disadvantage for Trump: Nikki Haley’s candidacy deprives him of an immediate triumph in the primaries and forces him to continue his campaign by attacking his Republican opponent rather than targeting Biden. “In doing so, he demonstrates his misogyny every day, which is not to please the female electorate.” Furthermore, the judicial calendar undoubtedly has surprises in store for Trump. Finally, the latter does not benefit from the cascading international crises that impose themselves on President Biden. “So far, the Biden administration is doing pretty well,” said Jacob Heilbrunn, who directs the geopolitics review The National Interest. The explosion in the Middle East did not occur, Israel did not invade Lebanon, Iran did not activate Hezbollah, the United States did not overreact and a ceasefire was established. profile in Gaza…” Furthermore, if the Republicans in Congress persist in blocking aid to Ukraine, the presidential camp will present them as allies of the Russia-China axis. Which would have the worst effect.

Basically, Joe Biden’s main weakness is the migrant crisis, constantly on the front page of the media. Faced with the scale of the influx of illegal immigrants at the Mexican border, the White House reacted too late. Now Donald Trump is making a powerful argument that Joe Biden is weak. The numbers are exploding. In November 2023 alone, 250,000 illegal immigrants crossed the border. In the final analysis, the political situation is extremely unpredictable. “The November 5 vote will be special: it will not be an election of acceptance but of rejection, says specialist in the history of the United States Vincent Michelot. The question will not be: ‘Who is the most popular?’ It will be: ‘Who is the most unpopular?’ But, the more the threat of a return of Trump becomes clearer, the more the voters who hate him will mobilize. Things will be decided in the home stretch, perhaps the last fortnight,” adds this professor at Sciences Po Lyon who lived in the United States. It is therefore too early to say that the fragile Biden will be no match for the vigorous Trump. Above all, the “team Biden” is not making the mistake Hillary Clinton made in 2016. She then underestimated Trump. Fortunately for him, Biden is an old crocodile.