Obama Insiders Say Major Biden Promise Is Laughable
Former Vice President Joe Biden, a leading contender for the 2020 Democrat presidential nomination, has expressed the view that once he takes office post-Donald Trump, Republicans will come to their senses and enact bipartisan legislative achievements.
In May, Biden told reporters in New Hampshire that Republicans would experience an “epiphany” once Trump is out of office.
Before a room of donors in Washington, D.C., on Monday night, Biden said that “with Trump gone, you’re going to begin to see things change,” according to The Washington Post.
It’s all part of the former vice president’s campaign strategy to make voters reminisce over the “good ole’ days.”
But it might not be working.
Politico reported in May that a number of congressional Republicans had dismissed Biden’s vision of bipartisanship as wishful thinking given the Democratic Party’s slide toward the far left.
Now, a number of Democratic aides and strategists who worked with or near Biden during former President Barack Obama’s time in office are similarly dismissing that vision as “delusional.”
But they are blaming Republicans.
According to a Wednesday report in The Daily Beast, many on the left doubt Biden could engineer a return to cooperative bipartisanship if elected.
Biden has a decades-long history of achieving bipartisan compromises with his ideological opponents, but several Obama-era veterans suggested to The Daily Beast that those days are dead and gone.
“[Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell and [North Carolina Rep.] Mark Meadows will rush to form the Woke Caucus. And Nelson Rockefeller will be revived from his grave,” Obama’s 2012 campaign press secretary Ben Labolt added.
Obama’s 2012 campaign manager, Jim Messina, expressed a dismissive view of Biden’s suggestion that Republicans would be willing to work with him as president and said he risks alienating his own Democratic base.
By claiming Republicans will work with him, Biden would “be met with great skepticism given Republican’s eight-year obstruction of Obama,” Messina said.
The Daily Beast noted that Republicans in Congress obstructed much of Obama’s agenda long before Trump arrived on the political scene and hinted few Democrats believe anything would be different once Trump leaves the White House.
Chris Kang, a former deputy assistant and deputy counsel to Obama, took particular exception to Biden’s wishful thinking on the topic of judicial nominees, which have been a key achievement of Trump’s tenure in office.
“Republicans are beyond senseless when it comes to judges, and it has nothing to do with Trump. Their unprecedented obstruction of Obama’s nominees started in January 2009 and ended with blocking Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court,” Kang said.
“They blocked nominees whom they originally recommended themselves … and in Obama’s last two years, they confirmed the fewest circuit judges since the 1800s. Democrats need to recognize that there are no ‘good old days’ to return to on judges.”
That view was echoed by Adam Jentleson, one-time deputy chief of staff to former Democrat Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada. Jentleson said Biden’s vision of bipartisanship was “either delusional or dishonest.”
“Republicans reaped enormous gains from their obstruction, like securing the balance of the Supreme Court for a generation or more. They know obstruction works and they will eat Biden’s lunch while he reminisces about the good old days,” Jentleson told The Daily Beast.
Biden’s campaign did not provide a comment to The Daily Beast.
The campaign did, however, point to a Quinnipiac poll from March, which showed that Democrat voters consider “bipartisanship” to be an important factor in picking their presidential nominee by a margin of 67 to 23 percent.
The poll also revealed that 52 percent of Democrat voters would prefer their nominee to “work with” Republicans, compared to 39 percent who want the nominee to “stand up to” Republicans.
It’s worth noting that Obama administration insiders harped on Republican obstruction of Obama while making zero mention of how Democrats obstructed former President George W. Bush.
They have staunchly obstructed and opposed virtually every single move made by Trump.
In the end, The Daily Beast article boiled down to condemnation and dismissal of Biden’s leadership skills.
Given that the people quoted in the piece are fairly well-versed in how Biden operates and what he is capable of achieving, their sentiments don’t bode well for his chances at winning the Democrat nomination.
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