Joe Biden's Withdrawal Is Not Enough
The best thing for his legacy is to resign
President Joe Biden has done the right thing by himself, his family, and the country by suspending his campaign for reelection to the White House. With that said, the next right thing he needs to do is to resign from the presidency at some point before the general election in order for Kamala Harris to become the 47th President of the United States, which will allow her to run against Donald Trump without being at an experiential disadvantage. Kamala Harris needs the power of incumbency to stand a chance in the general election, and Joe Biden is the only person who can make this happen. Without the power of incumbency, Kamala Harris is simply being set up to fail on the national stage.
Joe Biden is being heralded by some as a hero for doing the right thing and suspending his presidential campaign, but it would be especially naive to think that this move is a result of his altruistic nature. Biden has spent the lion’s share of his adult life pursuing powerful political positions, and he was willing to run for president again despite his manifest cognitive decline. By waiting so late to step aside, Biden has made it rather difficult for Harris, or any other Democratic candidate to run an effective campaign for the White House against Donald Trump. Evidently, Biden did not step aside for any other reason than the fact that he knew he was going to lose—and lose badly. After Donald Trump’s survival of an assassination attempt, and his undeniably heroic response of a defiant raised fist in the immediate aftermath, he is going into the general election with a halo effect, despite his numerous shortcomings and the fact that he is a convicted felon. Biden stood no chance of beating him. The polls were unambiguous. Harris will also struggle.
The best thing that Biden can do for his legacy, which incidentally includes nominating the first black woman to the Supreme Court, is stepping aside at some point before the election and creating the opportunity for the first black woman to become the President of the United States. By doing this, he would eliminate the question that so many will be trying to push in the coming months: Can a black woman really be President of the United States? The question will be irrelevant because she will be the incumbent running against Donald Trump. The power that will have cannot be understated. Biden has the opportunity to make the general election between an unproblematic incumbent/former prosecutor and a trouble-laden former president/convicted felon.
It is also important to note that there are no downsides to this decision. Biden is currently a lame-duck president, and everybody will know that his handing over to Harris was strategic, so there will be no discredit to him not finishing his term. It will also make his decision to not run again truly appear as though he has the best interest of his party and the country in mind. There will be no doubt about his seriousness regarding defeating Donald Trump electorally. Harris’ political future will also not be harmed in any way because she will still be allowed to serve two full terms (if so elected), given that Biden would resign with less than two years left in his term, which is perfectly in line with the conditions laid out in the 22nd Amendment to the United States Constitution. If Harris is unsuccessful in getting elected, she will still forever be the 47th President of the United States, and Biden will be the sole reason for the country having its first woman president.
Without question, Kamala Harris as a presidential candidate will produce some insane moments of racism and sexism. On social media right now, one can see many right-wing pundits shamelessly defaming her with all sorts of vile sexual innuendos because of her past relationships. While she has received a lot of support from prominent Democrats, there will be some who are privately opposed to her becoming the Democratic nominee. Biden benefitted greatly from being President Obama’s vice president, but the expectation that Harris would experience the same boost from serving as Biden’s vice president is naive. People will create all sorts of sophistical reasons why a black woman cannot and should not be the next in line to ascend to the presidency. Frankly, Harris needs help if she is going to be elected president, and a Biden endorsement is simply not going to cut it, especially considering that there are just a few months before the general election.
In response to being endorsed by Biden during his announcement to suspend his presidential campaign, Harris sent out the following on social media:
On behalf of the American people, I thank Joe Biden for his extraordinary leadership as President of the United States and for his decades of service to our country.
I am honored to have the President’s endorsement and my intention is to earn and win this nomination.
Notice her emphasis on earning and winning the nomination. It does not matter what Harris does to earn the nomination. She will forever be the woman who became the nominee because the sitting president of the United States’ growing senility rendered him incapable of respectably running for a second term. Harris needs to understand that there are some people who will never accept that she earned the nomination, regardless of what she does. She will always be “the DEI candidate.” Why bother trying to prove your worthiness to people who are constitutionally incapable of recognizing it? The truth of the matter is that being black in America means that whatever one achieves is always going to be construed as a gift from some white benefactor as opposed to the result of hard work and merit. When one understands this, it is very easy to just let go of the idea of proving oneself to people who will never consider one’s worthiness. One is free to simply pursue excellence while, to steal a Kamala word, being “unburdened” by the opinions of racists. (See my previous essay: Black People and Institutional Status Games). Also, Harris ought to be prepared for the “angry black woman” trope that will undoubtedly be used in the coming months.
Joe Biden has the opportunity to cement his legacy in stone by resigning and ensuring that Kamala Harris has the opportunity to run as the incumbent. If Joe Biden resigns, he will have been the vice president to the first black president of the United States, nominated the first black woman to the Supreme Court while the sitting president, and resigned as president to create the first woman (and black woman) president of the United States. That is a legacy that history will remember kindly. Knowing when to resign in order to protect one’s legacy is a political sense that so many power-hungry people affiliated with politics lack. Had the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had this sense, her legacy would not currently be in tatters. Biden has the opportunity to resign at the perfect time. Stepping aside for Kamala Harris to ascend to the presidency is the right thing to do.