As a Progressive, I Voted for Biden, Though He’s Not the Answer
by Dae-Han Song (Planning Committee, ISC Contents Team)
A few days before the election, I opened up my electronic ballot, voted on the various candidates and propositions, and arrived at my final choice: Donald Trump or Joe Biden. I looked at Joe Biden’s name and cringed. Not because I had any hesitation about Trump having been a horrible president, but because, like most progressives, voting for Joe Biden was (vomit level) unappealing. After all, let’s not forget that earlier this year, we were contemplating the possibility of a fight we could actually cheer for: Bernie Sanders taking on Donald Trump. I imagine some of us thought: surely after Hillary Clinton’s loss in 2016, the Democratic Party wasn’t simply going to field another Corporate Democrat. If there was any chance a candidate like Bernie Sanders (who openly excoriated Wall Street and proposed popular measures like taxing the super wealthy) could be elected, it would be running against a neofascist like Donald Trump. However, true to its nature, the Democratic Party leadership ran the same gamble throwing its full weight to close ranks on Bernie Sanders and nominate the generic Corporate Democrat Joe Biden: in an unprecedented move, presidential nominees Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar endorsed and campaigned for Biden immediately after dropping out.
As I considered my vote, I wondered if perhaps it was time the Democratic Party was taught a lesson for once again selling out its people, country, and the future of the planet. Perhaps, a consecutive electoral loss would destabilize the two party system by triggering an identity crisis (even if minor) within it. However, it was reading “Defeating Trump in 2020 and Advancing Strategy for Liberation” formulated by Leftroots, a national left formation committed to the long term struggle of building 21st century socialism in the US, that won me over to the united front against Trump’s fascism. As the document soberly (albeit unenthusiastically) notes: voting against Trump meant voting for Biden. Its first step towards building 21st Century Socialism in the US was by creating a broad united front that could halt the advance of Trump’s right-wing movement and in the process consolidate and strengthen an independent left movement that could then struggle against Biden and his neoliberals.
The LeftRoots strategy document starts off by making clear that while Trump is a neofascit, Biden is not a progressive but a neoliberal. Thus, we should first halt the advance of neofascist movements (emboldened by Trump), and then struggle against neoliberalism. Before proceeding, it’s important to note that Trump’s neofacism doesn’t mean that all 74 million people that voted for him are neofascists. However, his anti-immigrant, jingoistic, and racist rhetoric does enable and fuel racist right wing movements such as the Proud Boys that blame immigrants, Muslims, Black people, and other countries rather than the corporations and elite that profit from their suffering. While a Trump defeat might agitate these movements, a victory would have emboldened them while disheartening left movements.
Attendees in a Proud Boy rally in Portland, Oregon on Sept. 26, 2020. Source: Axios
However, Biden is a generic Corporate Democrat. From the fact that the majority of Wall Street money went to Biden’s campaign, to a foreign policy transition team composed of Obama foreign policy hawks, such as Samantha Power (a regime change militarist humanist), and domestic policy neoliberals, such as Seth Harris (that’ve helped Uber, Lyft, and DoorDash avoid paying minimum wage for their gig workers), it’s clear that Biden is a neoliberalist hawk.
Fortunately, unlike with Obama, the left and progressives have few illusions about Biden. Many social movements mobilized for Biden, not to cheer him on or celebrate his win as a conclusive victory, but to create better conditions for the left while preparing a more coherent and left social movement to hold Biden accountable and build beyond him. After all, changing the balance of forces (in a structure heavily stacked against third party progressives) requires using all political moments (including elections) to engage the broader public and swell an independent left project.
Now that Biden’s elected, the left in the US and outside of it must understand the nature and weaknesses of his administration to engage and fight with it. Even if the Democratic Party fails to win a majority in the Senate (winning the two Georgia run-off Senate races in Jan. 2021 would secure the Democrats 50 votes + the tie breaker from Vice President Kamala Harris), there is much (from reviving environmental rules to forgiving student debt and engaging with North Korea) that Biden can do through executive decree. Unsurprisingly, the members of Biden’s early rhetoric and domestic and foreign policy transition team signal a veering towards the right and a return to business as usual. This is despite being voted into office riding the groundswell of anti-Trump struggles demanding social transformation such as Black Lives Matter (with its 15 to 26 million people, across 40% of the US participating in their demonstrations) or the fact that progressive movements actively organized, mobilized, and flipped key swing states such as Georgia and Pennsylvania for Biden. So, while Joe Biden might not push for domestic policies helping ordinary Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic, or foreign ones bringing peace in the Korean Peninsula, social movements and organized people can achieve or build towards this by engaging and fighting with him full frontally from the outside. Meagan Day (a Democratic Socialists of America member and author of Bigger than Bernie) points out that the history of Biden and the Democratic Party indicate that if there’s going to be any coalition it’ll be with Republicans and not with the left wing of the party such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. As such, the left should build its forces to pressure and hold Biden accountable not in the backrooms of power but in the streets out in the public for all to see. Fortunately, unlike Obama, Biden is an extremely weak figure inspiring and commanding little illusion, and thus, loyalty from voters that supported him as just a stopgap measure against Trump.
Color portions of the map show areas that had Black Lives Matter protests. Source: New York Times
Such a tactical engagement and fight with Biden would create openings for social movements to expand and consolidate their base and networks while pressuring him. Recently re-elected (by wide margins) House of Representatives “squad” members—Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashida Tlaib—will play an important role in shaping public discourse by pressuring Biden to implement progressive policies in the People’s Charter supported and advocated for by many of the organizations that helped elect him such as the Working Families Party. As the national progressive grassroots organization Grassroots Global Justice Alliance notes, “We have no illusion that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris represent the policies and systemic change that our communities need. It’s time to be bold about our demands. It is up to us to push them to govern with the audacity it will take to pass the policies that our movements are creating.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (member of the “squad”) speaking outside of the Democratic National Committee headquarters on Nov. 19, 2020 pressuring Biden to support and implement the Green New Deal. Source: abcNEWS
As regards to the Korean Peninsula, Biden’s rhetoric calling North Korean leader Kim Jong-un a tyrant and a foreign policy transition team made up of human rights hawks offer little hope from Obama’s ineffective, dangerous, and malicious policy of strategic patience (i.e. waiting for North Korea to collapse). However, while the United States is (tragically) a key actor in peace in the Korean Peninsula, examining the history of broken US treaties (including Trump’s opportunistic rapprochement) should make clear that the US prioritizes geopolitical domination over peace in the Korean Peninsula. So, while understanding Biden’s foreign policy transition team and potential appointments is important, it shouldn’t be the main concern or activity for both Koreas and their social movements. Instead, we must lead and build our own path towards peace in the Korean Peninsula.
We won the first round against Trump. As the LeftRoots strategy document makes clear, if the US left is not to repeat its mistakes with Barack Obama, then it must keep mobilizing and organizing an independent power base that can hold the president accountable and build beyond him. It’s time for round two against Biden.