As a millennial and a Black man, I think my generation will regret deserting Joe Biden | Opinion
President Joe Biden’s last days in office are at hand and I’ve been feeling somber.
In 2020, I thought Biden had closed the chapter to one of the darkest times of American history. I thought his election was the American people saying they were no longer influenced by fear. Yet I was wrong.
Four years later, instead of choosing a president committed to democracy, the American people chose a leader in Donald Trump who surrounds himself with billionaires.
In his farewell address, Biden warned us about this.
“Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead,” Biden said. “We’ve seen the consequences all across America, and we’ve seen it before.”
How Biden’s presidency is ending is truly unfortunate because the American people and his own party rejected him. Biden was rejected by a working class that he helped, according to numerous metrics.
Tons of results, but no credit
According to Bloomberg, the number of people who gained access to healthcare soared to more than 21 million and under Biden’s watch, the number of uninsured Americans dropped below 8%, a record.
Biden helped more than 5 million Americans get their student loans forgiven. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, union membership has increased 412,000 since 2021.
Biden was the first American president to walk a picket line when he joined General Motors workers in Michigan last September.
Coming out of the darkest days of the pandemic, Biden enacted the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion economic stimulus that helped government and non-government workers and their families.
“When it comes to domestic policy, President Biden probably would go down as one of the most effective presidents that centered the working class,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, told the New York Times.
Yet even before his disastrous debate performance against Trump last June, polls showed Americans were not happy with Biden. His only failing was his age, which last time I checked he couldn’t control. He turned 82 in November and had visibly slowed down since beating Trump in 2020. This was more important to Americans than what he did.
It was ironic that on the same day of his farewell address, it was announced that Hamas and Israel agreed to a ceasefire that will go into effect later this month. There was no applause or congratulations given to Biden, especially among Democrats who were divided on this issue.
Biden is not without faults but he was a man with conviction who tried to help the working class. America will have a hard time voting someone like that into office again.
A long road ahead
As a 30-year-old, I was most puzzled when my generation abandoned Biden. Last June, a University of Chicago survey found that just one-third of Americans under 40 would back Biden. As a Black man, I was equally puzzled that young Black voters no longer supported Biden either.
“In 2020, 89% of Black voters aged 18-29 voted for Biden, as well as 78% of those aged 30-44, “ wrote National Public Radio last June, roughly a month before Biden stepped aside and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic presidential nominee.
“In the latest GenForward survey, just 33% said they would support him if the election were held today.”
Among the reasons that I’ve heard, it appears that his being a white man with privilege was a big infraction. Trump isn’t white and privileged?
Frankly, my generation got Biden wrong.
Biden saw the presidency as a moral responsibility. He has said many times that what spurred him to run in 2020 was the racial hatred visited upon the University of Virginia in 2017 by Neo-Nazis and other white supremacists. Biden was not driven by enriching himself or his supporters. He tried to help heal a country divided.
Sadly, not enough Americans seemed to care about our divisions or our democracy.
This story was originally published January 18, 2025 at 8:35 AM.
