BIDEN. As the midterm elections approach, Joe Biden is adopting a campaign strategy that does not seem to be effective. His fight for abortion seems to put the economy, the priority of Americans, in the background.
How to reverse a trend so that the dynamic is in his favor as well as for his entire political family? This is the question that Joe Biden has been trying to answer in recent days, just over two weeks of midterm elections which promise to be complicated for the President of the United States and the candidates of the Democratic Party. The tenant of the White House has embarked on a perilous strategy for this end of the campaign, in which he gets involved late, as planned. The Head of State is indeed seeking to bring back votes in favor of the contenders in the House of Representatives and the Senate by making the defense of the right to abortion his hobbyhorse.
The fight for the legalization of abortion at the antipodes of priorities?
On June 24, the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States to give free rein to the States to legislate on the legality or not of abortion had aroused palpable emotion within the country, as well as a wind of anger and of revolt. The jurisdiction being mainly composed of conservative members appointed by former Republican presidents Georges Bush (father and son) and Donald Trump, the angle of attack was all found for Joe Biden: denouncing the decision of the conservatives and calling on voters to vote in favor of candidates for elective office in Parliament who will be able to support its action. Starting with that of “setting in stone Roe v. Wade (the name of the judgment guaranteeing access to abortion and canceled by the Supreme Court, editor’s note) once and for all.”
Problem: if the process is already engaged with the House of Representatives which adopted such a resolution, in the Senate, the deal is more complex. Its adoption requires 60% of the vote and not a simple majority. A major challenge for Joe Biden who has only 51 votes in his favor out of the 100 senators. And at this stage, it seems unlikely to see the President of the United States widen his majority in the Upper House.
Especially since this strategy of a speech very focused on the right to abortion could, in the end, turn against him. Because the subject is far from being the priority of the Americans. Its constituents are focused on one thing: their portfolio. Inflation continues to climb in the United States, reaching 8.2% over one year in September. The prices of all everyday products, especially food and fuel, are soaring and the subject is making headlines. Despite low unemployment (currently 3.5%), which has been falling steadily since the peak in the spring of 2020 linked to Covid (14.7%), there is great mistrust of the Biden administration. The American President will indeed use 15 million barrels of oil from the national strategic reserve to supply gas stations and lower prices at the pump, but his popularity rating, which had risen again during the summer , has been going down lately. His few legislative victories even seem forgotten.
Between 42 and 43%. It is with one of the lowest rates of favorable opinion that Joe Biden advances towards the midterms, these midterm elections during which the Americans are called upon to elect a new House of Representatives and a third of the Senate. The President of the United States, who has the majority in the two parliamentary chambers (although it is only played with one vote in the Senate), is therefore advancing feverishly towards a ballot which could change the situation politically, two years after his arrival at the White House, and two years from a new call for voters to vote, this time to elect their head of state for the next four years. If he is the president to have won the most votes from voters in the history of the presidential election (more than 81 million – Obama had obtained 69 in 2008 and 65 in 2012, 2e and 3e highest totals, Trump accounting for just under 63), Joe Biden has become quite unpopular across the Atlantic. And the Democratic Party (left) which holds power could therefore suffer.
Because since his installation in the Oval Office, “his situation has only deteriorated” summarizes, with Internet user, Marie-Christine Bonzom, former French journalist in the United States, in charge of monitoring the White House. Between the Covid crisis and the migration crisis in Mexico, Joe Biden tried to manage, at the same time, several hot issues, without managing to resolve them, before deciding in favor of the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan. A departure which took place in total chaos, an attack having been perpetrated at Kabul airport, killing 13 American soldiers. A pivotal episode in the beginning of Joe Biden’s mandate: since that day, the almost octogenarian (79 years old) must govern a country with a majority of unfavorable opinions. This is not a first: before him, Obama and Trump found themselves in a similar situation.
Is it because of his image which is not unanimous that he is discreet during this electoral campaign? At the opposite extreme from Donald Trump – who, admittedly, does not hold any elective office – Joe Biden is not present alongside candidates from the Democratic Party and is content, during his speeches, only with discuss the general themes dear to his political family, as explained by the specialized American site Politico. His few speeches focus on his legislative victories and on attacks on a Republican Party that he considers disconnected and extremist.
On the contrary, he promotes his policy and the texts he managed to pass, in particular the “Inflation Reduction Act of 2022”, mid-August, to try to limit the impact of inflation, through a reduction medicine costs for seniors, the granting of loans to households for any energy investment (electric car, solar panel, thermal renovation). To his credit also, the restriction of the carrying of a firearm. In 2021, its “Build Back Better Plan” provided free access to a school structure for children aged 3 and 4, paid four-week leave for family and medical reasons for workers and free meals in the schools. These advances have allowed him to see his popularity rating rise in recent weeks (it had fallen to 38% at the end of July).
That’s the whole point of this campaign. No certainty emerges before the ballot. For Marie-Christine Bonzom, “we must expect a victory for the Republican Party in the House of Representatives. On the other hand, for the moment, victory in the Senate seems less easy for the Republicans because of Joe Biden’s slight improvement. over the summer. It is possible that the Democrats will manage to maintain a very narrow majority in the Senate.” If he were to lose one of the two chambers, the American president would no longer be in a position of strength. “In these cases, it is a partial or total cohabitation between the Republicans and President Biden. He will be even more weakened than during the first two years of his mandate. On the political mechanics, his legislative initiatives will be compromised. will be extremely difficult to pass any law. It is quite likely that we are heading towards a legislative impasse, “explains Marie-Christine Bonzom.