Projection on the wall of the African American Civil War Memorial Museum, Washington D.C., during a Palestine solidarity demonstration, December 2023.
Given the commentary on the election of Donald Trump, there is on the liberal left a clear understanding that the Biden-Harris administration did very little to appeal to the average American voter. Ralph Nader, for instance, suggested that worse than handing the vote over to Trump, the Democratic Party is no more likely this time around than in 2016 to do any soul searching and house cleaning.1 Both to his credit and his discredit, as a reformer, Nader said the quiet part out loud by stating that the Democratic Party cannot be reformed. A worse case of disavowal can be found in an interview with Thomas Frank, who credited Joe Biden for having been the most progressive President, when it comes to labour issues, since Franklin Roosevelt.2 While acknowledging that huge sums of cash are given to both parties, he failed to mention that many donors give to both parties and that both of them serve the same Wall Street interests, thereby ignoring the elephant in the room that BlackRock CEO Larry Fink had gifted the media in the days before the election.3 This underscores the complicity of the duopoly that not only keeps out third parties but, more importantly, keeps socialism at bay, an ideology that Frank, in his book on populism, characterizes as un-American. In other words, liberals, and even many leftists, are satisfied to identify the many problems caused by the neoliberal order, but few draw the obvious link to capitalism. So long as the wealth of the United States is assured, pleading for this or that cause, social issue, underserved community, or other, is par for the course among the conscientious.
Beyond lamenting the paralysis of liberal democracy, which has been a reality since the early-to-mid-nineteenth century, there are a few takeaways from this election that can nevertheless serve the renewal of left forces. First, the failure of the Democrats is not due to the person of Kamala Harris, who is generally unlikeable but nevertheless competent as a neoliberal technocrat. It is because many were unwilling to ignore the genocide in Gaza that is happening with the full support of the Biden administration. The fact that the same revulsion is not felt about the proxy war in Ukraine is an indication that the revulsion does not go deep enough, but one does not want to complain too much. The slaughter of civilians and the demolition of civilian infrastructure is certainly not on the same order of obscenity as the deaths that occur between warring armies. And both parties have engaged in the draconian policing and censorship of Palestine solidarity. A second takeaway is the fact that this election showed the limits of the Noam Chomsky and Adolph Reed injunction to vote for the lesser of the two evils. With the Trump administration seeming to be potentially less disastrous than the neoliberal acceleration towards nuclear Armageddon, there was this time around no clear indication of which would be worse: Trump would be worse on domestic policy and Harris on foreign policy.4 Either way, the sense that the two parties tag team against the general interest gave third party challengers a clear conscience against the bipartisan blackmail.
A third and less certain takeaway is the sense that the Harris debacle and the genocide of Palestinians has made it easier for the left to move on from culture wars. In the Barbie movie, which despite itself explains so much about our cultural moment, the problem with Ken is that he is naively sexist and did not learn the lesson that a suited gentleman in the “real world” had imparted to him, which is the fact that the “patriarchy” is still in power but has become more sophisticated, for example, by bankrolling films like Barbie and a more diverse line of dolls. The garden variety left, including its anarchist and hipster variants, has not got beyond the “do both” class plus identity logic of intersectionality, even when, for example, feminists identify with the 99 percent.5 The Trump “movement” will undoubtedly add fuel to culture war fire, and “progressive” neoliberals will probably respond in kind. This retaliation has partly to do with the middle class needing to justify its class distinction and advantage against the working class, which it likes to consider the natural ally and base of the far right. The reason the left will not likely do better than it has since the time BLM displaced OWS – causing the “left” to go all in with decoloniality, in the academic sector, and multipolarity, in the Stalinist sector – is because it on the whole rejects Marxist internationalism, opting instead for weak power in metropolitan centres and comprador power among weak nations. Think of Greece, Spain, Mexico or Brazil. There are also aspects to this issue that no genuine socialism can resolve, as addressed for example by Fredric Jameson in his book, An American Utopia: Dual Power and the Universal Army.6 However, problems that no one can resolve, or that are already resolved by normative ethical and legal standards, which is to say, in universalist terms, will continue to be defined as failings of the universalist, class-oriented left, especially by people who are more committed to identity than to socialism. In the interregnum, “monsters” like privilege theory and Afro-pessimism will continue to proliferate, as will efforts to embed identity politics in left politics and verbiage.
To understand why it is that more than 74 million Americans voted for a criminal charlatan who tried to coup his own country, one needs to combine all the resources of scholarly knowledge. In the most immediate sense, voters voted for the alternate of the two parties. The following, which itemizes the record of the Biden administration, are some of the main reasons why:
2021
After assuming office, Biden failed to impeach Donald Trump, denying investigations into the January 6 coup plot for more than one year. During the January 6 storming of the capital, within which professional and armed militias acted as a special detachment whose mission it was to prevent the vote counting, Biden said nothing, eventually calling on Trump, the leader of the coup, to address the nation. Biden ultimately failed to jail Trump for the January 6 insurrection and for stealing government documents. Biden persistently advocated a strong Republican party and he increased spending for Capitol police by $2 billion, even though what occurred on January 6 was a government and intelligence-orchestrated stand-down that included senior agents of Capitol police who were later denounced by the rank and file, some of whom committed suicide. Among the more egregious acts of post-representational government, the Biden administration allowed some 800,000 Americans to die from COVID-19 and failed to mitigate anti-vaxx disinformation. Through the CIA and a subsection of the Department of Energy that had previously lied to the public about Saddam Hussein’s WMDs, and with all of this reproduced by the stenographers in the newspapers of note, not to mention supposedly progressive sources like The Intercept, Biden perpetuated the Republican-concocted lie that COVID-19 originated in a lab in Wuhan, allowing neo-McCarthyite witch hunts against organizations like EcoHealth Alliance and the World Health Organization, thereby undermining pandemic research and public health policy. Biden also propagandized disinformation about genocide in Xinjiang while expanding the trade war with China. He at the same time appointed Victoria Nuland – who successfully plotted the removal of the democratically elected Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, which ultimately led to the Russian invasion of 2022 – as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, the fourth-ranking position in the State Department.
Biden neglected the state of Texas after winter storm Uri. He maintained Trump’s child detention centres for migrant families and ultimately failed to reform immigration policy. He advocated the PRO Act, which strengthens the power of union bosses over the rank and file. He defended the Department of Justice’s seizure of the phone records of Washington Post journalists, which had started under Trump. He defended the bombing of Gaza and the ethnic cleansing of Jerusalem in May 2021. He appointed Neera Tanden as his senior advisor and staff secretary, a founder of the pro-austerity Center for American Progress. Biden failed to raise taxes on corporations and the wealthy, overseeing the largest upward transfer of wealth since Obama and Trump. He broke his election promise of a public option for health care. His bipartisan infrastructure bill was reduced from $4.7 trillion over ten years to $355 billion. The Build Back Better bill raised the price of gas to pay for bridge repairs, a regressive tax policy. The bill also facilitated Wall Street investor privatization of roads, bridges and water systems. It included state and local tax cuts for the wealthy. To the ire of most Democrats, Biden refused to criticize Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema’s railroading of the infrastructure bill. He also failed to get rid of the Senate filibuster, which allows rural areas, about 17 percent of the electorate, to control the Senate.
Biden increased military spending with the goal of an eventual war with China, which is a nuclear power that cannot be defeated militarily. The same goes for Russia and this is well understood by military analysts. He increased government tracking of “extremists.” He reversed his election promise to abolish the death penalty, pledging to execute the Boston bomber. He exonerated Trump and US Attorney General Bill Barr for their attack on protesters in Lafayette Square in June of 2020. In June of 2021, the Biden government bombed Syria and Iraq. Vice President Kamala Harris cancelled a planned visit to Detroit after flooding in late June. Biden welcomed Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince, who had dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi killed in 2018. Biden approved a Trump arms deal for $23 billion with the United Arab Emirates. Kamala Harris announced to the Vietnamese that “America is back.” Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez signed an anti-China resolution supporting Hong Kong separatists.
Biden failed to cancel $1.3 trillion in student debt. In August, he cancelled $10,000 in student debt for people earning under $125,000 per year. This initiative was later struck down, as could be expected, by a Trump-appointed judge. He did cancel $5.8 billion worth of debt for 300,000 students with disabilities, which was due to the streamlining of a programme already in existence with the Department of Education. Biden made it faster by eliminating the monitoring process. He later overturned the possibility of student loan bankruptcy. The Biden administration killed Afghani civilians as the US Army was leaving the country. He did not re-enter the Iran nuclear deal that had been rescinded by Trump. During the spread of the COVID Delta variant, Biden pushed economic and school reopening, terminating pandemic relief measures and unemployment benefits on Labor Day. He collaborated with Ukraine to “retake” Crimea from Russia. In September, he deported 12,000 Haitian refugees. From January 2021, Biden had deported 600,000 immigrants. He continued Trump policies towards Cuba. He allowed human rights lawyer Steven Donziger to be prosecuted (persecuted) by the justice system in the interest of Big Oil. The Federal Election Commission ruled in November that foreign capital can be used to influence American politics. For example, foreign nationals can support ballot committees and direct ballot initiatives, directly affecting domestic policy. So much for Russiagate. Biden imposed sanctions on Nicaragua after a Sandinista election victory. He imposed sanctions on Afghanistan, causing conditions of starvation for 23 million people. He boycotted the Beijing Winter Olympics under false pretences. Through the CDC and OSHA, he eliminated COVID safety standards.
2022
The US instigated war in Ukraine, which came to fruition in 2022. In January, the US stole $7 billion from Afghanistan as 13,000 newborns had starved to death. Biden broke the Minsk II Ceasefire Agreement, stoking a NATO proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. The Biden administration announced that the US debt is $30 trillion (today $37), a crisis staved off through bank bailouts and military Keynesianism, but which increases wealth inequality. Billionaire wealth increased 90 percent, to $5.5 trillion, since the pandemic started in 2020, leading to inflation, low wages, lower standards of living, consumer debt ($18 trillion), student debt, layoffs, school closures and cuts to health care. Biden abandoned his promise of $15 minimum wage. If standards of living had kept pace since the early 1970s, minimum wage would be over $35 per hour. Biden did not close tax loopholes on billionaires and tax evaders. As in the 1920s, American capitalists are seeking to solve the debt crisis through war and austerity. JP Morgan Chase has declared that war with China has already begun. The use of war to solve economic problems is a core feature of fascist ideology. The obvious problem is that war does not solve economic crises, but a war economy can be used to bolster an economy in conditions of social, moral, cultural and political decay. War with China was the priority of the Biden-Harris administration, fuelling the normalization of far-right fascism alongside genocide, as well as anti-communism. Rather than tax the rich to reduce debt, Biden borrowed money from China and Japan. The Ways and Means Committee rejected the taxation of corporations.
When Russia invaded Ukraine in February, some 100,000 US troops had been relocated from Afghanistan to Europe. By May, some $20 billion in weapons had been sent to Ukraine. Throughout his term, Biden sent $175 billion in weapons to Ukraine and $22 billion to Israel. These sums are part of an annual $1.5 trillion for military expenditures. Taxpayers subsidized weapons manufacturers without any say by Congress. Biden did not stop oil drilling on federal lands and increased natural gas extraction. He reduced coverage under Medicare, which contributed to privatization. He authorized the largest Medicare premium hikes in its 57-year history. He refused to lower the cost of drugs and vaccines. He appointed anti-Social Security crusader Andy Biggs as head of Social Security. Touting himself a Rooseveltian pro-labour president, Biden did nothing to prevent union busting. Although he promised in 2019 that he would codify Roe v. Wade into law, Biden refused to defend abortion legislation. Biden tripled FBI warrantless communications data searches. He redirected COVID funding for war in Ukraine. He ignored Israel’s murder of the American Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. He sent 450 troops to Somalia. After US sanctions, the Russian ruble became the best-performing currency of 2022. Biden did not rescind Trump’s reductions of protections for endangered species.
By August, Biden had expanded Trump’s border wall projects. He allowed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to visit Taiwan to provoke China. A phony inflation scam led to the highest gas profits and corporate company profits in US history. After the Homeland Security hearings ended, no top officials were charged for the January 6 insurrection. The Inflation Reduction Act was scuttled in the Senate, as expected, giving handouts to renewable energy corporations in tax credits, concessions to fossil fuel companies, new leases for gas and oil exploration, no new limits on carbon emissions, weakening of the Environmental Protection Agency, help to the health insurance industry, protections for Big Pharma, zero impact on inflation, no tax hikes, side deals for pipeline permits, and tax initiatives as well as grants to companies like Exxon and Sunoco. European governments criticized the Inflation Reduction Act as economic war. The kinds of jobs that increased under Biden were mostly in the low-pay hospitality industry. In August, the Federal Reserve forecast “pain” for working families as well as a recession. Biden ended free COVID-19 tests that had been made available through the postal service. On the television news show 60 Minutes, Biden declared the pandemic was over and pledged his commitment to war with Russia and China. At that time, 3000 Americans were dying of COVID-19 every week.
The Biden administration gave the Pentagon wartime procurement powers. Before the end of 2022, Biden had detained more migrants at the US-Mexico border than all previous presidents. He used his presidential powers to reduce the number of border crossings. Biden ended negotiations with North Korea. In November, Biden fell asleep during an interview. Biden called on Congress to prevent a railway strike, banning a strike by 120,000 workers by signing bipartisan anti-strike legislation. Biden pushed the DNC to put South Carolina first in the primaries, giving “white” working-class voters over to the GOP. The CIA militant Abigail Spanberger was chosen to oversee contested states.
2023
In 2023, the National Defense Authorization Act passed a record $858 billion military budget. Biden followed the Trump plan to build the US-Israel embassy on Palestinian land. The omnibus bill included $45 billion more for Ukraine in weaponry and ended the Iran nuclear deal for good. Biden failed to end “right to work” laws, which encourage employees to avoid unionization. Biden allowed states to determine what they want regarding the eviction moratorium. His administration heroically shot down a stray Chinese weather balloon. Seymour Hersch confirmed US involvement in the bombing of the Nord Stream II pipeline, an act of ecoterrorism against a NATO ally (Germany). Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg ignored the East Palestine railroad disaster. Biden banned all on-foot immigration at the Southern border, denying emigrants asylum rights. Food stamp allocations were cut for 42 million Americans. The Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank were bailed out by the federal government. Breaking his election promises, Biden approved a huge oil exploration project on federal land in Alaska.
In April, Federal Reserve plans kicked into gear and job cuts began. The CIA revealed that Ukrainian President Zelinsky had embezzled $400 million of US taxpayer money, with no consequence. Biden escalated the assault on migrant rights, making all migrants illegal and sending 1500 US soldiers to the Southern border. The Biden administration trained Ukrainian pilots on F-16s, breaking one of the last of its red lines to prevent war with Russia. This ignored the fact that only 20 percent of Americans wanted to expand American involvement in Ukraine. Biden proposed $1 trillion in social spending to finance debt and $375 million more for Ukraine. This “social spending” would bring cuts to social programmes like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, health care coverage, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP food stamp assistance), rent support, housing assistance, education spending and public transportation.
In June, the US and the United Kingdom signed the “Atlantic Declaration,” a plan for economic warfare against Russia and China. The Biden White House intervened in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and Pacific Maritime Association tentative agreement with 22,000 West Coast dockworkers – after contracts had expired for more than one year. By June, 1.5 million recipients were cut from Medicare coverage, which was expected to grow to 24 million. Disenrollment was defined as “medical unwinding.” Biden cut 4 to 5 million from Medicaid health coverage by August. Biden made reductions to the child tax credit and to expanded unemployment insurance, as well as SNAP. All of this caused child poverty to increase by 12 percent. Between April and November, some 2 million children had been removed from Medicaid. Biden sent illegal cluster bombs to Ukraine. He sent $350 million in weapons to Taiwan. The Secretary of State Tony Blinken green lit the extradition of Julian Assange. The eventual release of Julian Assange from US extradition, which had no legal basis, is possibly the signature “achievement” of the Biden administration. In August, it was revealed that the US pressured Pakistan to remove Imran Khan as Prime Minister. So much for Russiagate. Biden fast-tracked border wall construction in South Texas in exchange for $100 billion in GOP support for Ukraine war spending. By the end of 2023, Biden’s ICE border police doubled the number of deportations.
Biden supported Benjamin Netanyahu’s declaration of war against Gaza, which is under Israeli occupation. Biden threatened war with Iran. He travelled to Israel the day after it bombed hospitals and killed 500 Palestinians. After Israel bombed the Jabaliya refugee camp, the US accepted the fact that Israel made Palestinian civilians into “legitimate targets.” Biden supported Netanyahu from November to December as 20,000 Palestinian civilians were killed and hospitals bombed. The Israeli regime murdered doctors, nurses and patients, stacking them in piles of body bags. Biden responded to this by opening an Education Department inquiry into anti-semitism on college campuses. Meanwhile, Congress increased the military budget by $145 billion to a total $884 billion. Biden expanded the Israeli conflict to the Houthis, with the US and the UK bombing cities in Yemen.
2024
In January 2023, Biden dropped bombs on Yemen, Syria, Iraq and Somalia. The Biden administration meddled in the Taiwan elections. So much for Russiagate. Biden continued government investigations into campus anti-semitism. He used the Espionage Act to attack WikiLeaks member Joshua Schulte with a 40-year prison sentence for exposing global spying by the CIA. Through the Emergency National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, he got the GOP to approve another $118 billion in war funding for Ukraine, again, in exchange for the Anti-Immigration Bill. Biden did nothing to stop the killing in Gaza, even after it was estimated that there were more than 100,000 civilian deaths and injuries. As he dismissed an International Court of Justice ruling on the possibility of genocide in Gaza, Biden became known as “Genocide Joe.” The US then kidnapped Haitian President Ariel Henry, who was forced to resign. So much for Russiagate. The federal budget cut $500 million from education, the first major cut to education since 2015. Biden once again expanded warrantless surveillance. He appropriated more money for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. He broke another of his red lines and authorized long-range missiles for Ukraine. Biden and the GOP invited the war criminal Netanyahu to address Congress at the same time that Israel was bombing Rafah and police were cracking down on encampments at the University of California and Wayne State in Detroit. After Trump was charged with 34 criminal counts, Biden stated that “no one is above the law.” This was while the International Criminal Court had charged Netanyahu and Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes leading to genocide. Biden rescinded the right to asylum, adopting Trump’s anti-immigration policies and breaking his election promise to protect immigration rights. After a Trump assassination attempt, Biden said that violence “is not us.” This was as The Lancet medical journal estimated that 186,000 had died in Gaza. Under the Biden administration, and after a NATO summit, the alliance established an office in Kiev. After his debate fiasco with Trump in July, Biden refused to step down as the incumbent candidate for 2024. The CDC declared COVID to be “endemic,” which is the consequence of failing to coordinate an elimination policy. By then, approximately 1 million Americans were being infected daily, contributing to the several millions who now suffer from Long COVID. States then moved to criminalize mask-wearing. Whereas the US falsely blamed China for creating the COVID-19 virus and causing the pandemic, the CDC is at this moment doing very little to prevent the H5N1 bird flu virus from spreading.
2025 and Onward
What is most surprising about the Biden administration is that it managed to lumber on for four full years, almost as though a demonic force was keeping this shell of a man alive to do its destructive bidding. In the summer of 2020, after Biden barked his campaign at prospective voters like a half-deaf army sergeant, it was obvious that his candidacy was a pitch for militarism. I made a meme re-using the “how about a nice cup of shut the fuck up” soldier meme to indicate the fact that he was clearly giving people their marching orders. After some 500,000 deaths in Ukraine, and close to 300,000 deaths in Palestine, Biden and Harris did the US public one significant favour: they made it plain – once again, for those who pay attention – not only that the Democratic Party is as a party of Wall Street and the Pentagon, but that the latter are destructive anti-social forces rather than the bastions of liberalism that the American Creed preaches. The subject of interest during the next four years of Trump is whether American progressives and the hangers on of a dying liberalism can move beyond their bogus politics of reforming this bourgeois party. This question cannot be displaced by focusing on BRICS or putting one’s hope in the “axis of resistance.” Indeed, it can only be displaced by the working masses organized internationally in the interest of human survival and universal emancipation.
Notes
1. Ralph Nader Radio Hour, “The Mourning After – Ralph Nader Radio Hour,” YouTube (November 9, 2024), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vos3IJghWFc.
2. The Zero Hour with RJ Eskow, “THE ELITES HAD IT COMING (with Thomas Frank),” YouTube (November 9, 2024), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SogjrjL1Ti8.
3. Geopolitical Economy Report, “Billionaire BlackRock CEO: ‘Doesn’t matter’ who wins US election; Trump & Kamala benefit Wall Street,” YouTube (November 3, 2024), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chPfp01rsD0.
4. I recommend this interview with Pepe Escobar regarding the geopolitical challenges that lie ahead: Dialogue Works, “Pepe Escobar: Iran’s Explosive Reaction to Israel’s Attack - BRICS Just Changed EVERYTHING!” YouTube (November 5, 2024), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEqxtWsDIGQ.
5. See for example Liza Featherstone, “All That Remains of Neoliberal Identity Politics Is Fascism,” Jacobin (October 31, 2024), https://jacobin.com/2024/10/all-that-remains-of-neoliberal-identity-politics-is-fascism; THIS IS REVOLUTION podcast, “Is the Racial Reckoning Over? ft. Toure Reed,” YouTube (July 9, 2024), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vhq-kItsIx0.
6. Fredric Jameson, An American Utopia: Dual Power and the Universal Army (London: Verso, 2016).