Biden's "antifa" kickoff to this 2024 Presidential campaign
President Biden kicked off his 2024 re-election campaign on January 5 with a direct challenge to Donald Trump’s openly declared dictatorial intentions and a clear explanation of Trump’s direction of and participation in the insurrection of January 6, 2021.1 AP News provides the text.2
Democrats Abroad posted this video boosting the message3:
Congressman Jamie Raskin addressed Democrats Abroad - of which he was once a member when he lived in France - on January 6 and also boosted the message.4
I’m calling this an “antifa” (anti-fascist) message because it highlights the themes of Trump’s menace to democracy and of accountability for Trump for his large role in the January 6 insurrection. And, yes, Trump is currently pimping a straight-up fascist message.
Biden’s speech also was addressing the Supreme Court (though not by name), which has agreed to hear a case on whether the 14th Amendment disqualification clause for people who have taken an oath to defend the Constitution and later engage in an insurrection against it is qualified to even appear on election ballots for an office in the US government, much less serve in one.
Timothy Snyder has a worthwhile analysis of the political and Constitutional dilemma this creates for the current rightwing Supreme Court and their billionaire sponsors. The wording of the 14th Amendment is pretty straightforward, and the conservatives on the Court claim to use an “originalist” approach which says the Constitution should be interpreted strictly on the basis of what the Framers actually meant at the time it was written.
But they will have to engage in some very creative reasoning to hold that the 14th Amendment doesn’t apply to Trump in this case. Because to get there, they basically will have to rule that the 14th Amendment does not mean what it says.
Certainly one can have a debate about who should be able to run for office. In our constitutional system, however, a candidate for president must be a U.S. citizen, born in the United States (or to American parents), of a certain age, who has resided in the U.S. for a certain period, and who has not previously been an officer of government and taken part in an insurrection (directly or by giving aid and comfort).
Of those five limitations (citizenship, conditions of birth, age, residence, lack of insurrectionary past), surely the last is the least constricting. The citizenship requirement rules out more than 95% of the people in the world. Birth seems a bit unfair. Its circumstances are not something that people choose. And it excludes people who have actually chosen America by becoming citizens. There are foreign-born citizens who want to run for president, and who would be strong candidates. Age might or might not be reasonable as a limitation — should we really exclude people under 35? And if we do, perhaps we should also exclude people over a certain age? …
[Some] people make [the argument] that Trump is not an insurrectionist because he has not been convicted as such in court. I don’t think that this is an argument made in good faith. Trump himself does not contest the facts. Indeed, his purported campaign for president right now is based precisely on his participation in an insurrection, which he advertises in public appearances and in social media.5 [my emphasis]
In a follow-up piece, Snyder also write:
In advising the Court to keep Trump on the ballot, political commentators elevate their own fears about others' resentment above the Constitution. But the very reason we have a Constitution is to handle fear and resentment. To become a public champion of your own own fears and others' resentments is to support an insurrectionary regime.
The purpose of the insurrection clause of the Constitution (the third section of the Fourteenth Amendment) is not to encourage insurrections! If we publicly say that that Supreme Court should disregard it because we fear insurrections, we are making insurrections more likely. We are telling Americans that to undermine constitutional rule they must only intimate that they might be violent.6 [my emphasis]
And he continues directly, “To advocate pitchfork rulings is to endorse regime change; to issue pitchfork rulings is to announce regime change.” That may be a bit of hyperbole. Maybe.
The “MSNBC-liberal view” has its limits
Snyder is serious about wanting to defend liberal democracies against authoritarian challenges. Though his “pitchfork” metaphor may not be quite the correct one here. Sure, it’s used to symbolize an angry mob and the Republicans are obviously not averse to inciting angry and violent mobs to get their way. But SCOTUS deciding in Trump’s favor on some spurious grounds won’t be the result of a band of righteous farmers ready to start an early-modern-style peasant war. It will be caving in to plutocrats like Clarence Thomas’ sugar-daddy Harlen Crow (only one of several7) and Samuel Alito’s good personal friend Paul Singer.8
The democracy-vs.-autocracy/fascism position is good overall framing for the 2024 campaign by the Democrats. But then there is the chronic Democratic self-inflicted limitation of being reluctant to fight for their own side. This is part of what activist Democrats sometime deride as the “MSNBC liberal” approach: painting Trump as a vital threat to democracy and the rule of law - which he is - but then concentrating on the need to appeal to that legendary group, the Moderate Republicans, who are almost as difficult to locate as the Tooth Fairy.
That produces catering to the high-profile group of mostly staunchly conversative Republicans known as Never Trumpers and bleating a lot about the need for bi-partisanship and looking for hippies to punch. For establishment liberals, particularly as we see them manifested on MSNBC, Trump may be embarrassing and uncouth. But it’s those dang hippie progressives who are the real problem!
To be consistent with the democracy-vs.-authoritarianism framing, the Democrats would do well to drop the word bipartisanship from their political vocabulary.
The Democrats are also really not being consistent with the pro-democracy message by calling off state primaries when candidates other than Biden have qualified to appear on the ballot.9 Primaries are important. And the institutionalization of primaries has been an important and successful part of the party reform movement starting in the 1960s to increase grassroots democratic participation in the candidate selection.
Since Biden has no obvious major challenger for the nomination, it may have little practical effect on the Presidential race this year. But, still, the Democratic caucuses and primaries have been an important vehicle for unlikely intra-party challengers from Gene McCarthy to Barack Obama. They are an important measure of base voters’ sentiments and one of the far too few checks on the influence of big donors in candidate selection.
Yes, specific issues matter, too
The appeal to defend democracy and the rule of law, as critical as it is in itself, has to be translated into more specific appeals. Republicans can and do present themselves in rightwing populist fashion as defenders of The People and True Democracy. But they also offer a large range of enemies for their constituency to hate: Jewish Globalists implementing a Great Replacement project to replace American whites with members of “inferior races”; Critical Race Theory; DEI (a current favorite bogeyman who most Republicans know is supposed to be bad but probably can’t say what it stands for); mythical Black Lives Matter protesters burning down cities; unbelievably bad (if undefined) corruption by Hunter Biden; and, of course, “communists, Marxists, fascists, and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country.”10
The Biden campaign’s initial framing of the Trump threat to democracy and the right to vote provides a good - and realistic - overarching theme for the campaign. But they are also going to have to push back against some of the false demagogic claims of the Republicans. One of their most emotional ones is the whole set of immigration issues which they are calling the menace of a Great Replacement and poisoning of the blood of white America. The Democrats have to push back effectively and discredit false claims being made on immigration. Doing what the Biden White House has been doing, which is using me-too tough-on-the-border rhetoric and policies without doing anything to defuse false and inflammatory anti-immigrant claims by Republicans is essentially surrendering that issue to the Trumpistas. And it produces bad policy besides being bad politics.11
The Democrats also have one very emotional “culture-war” issue working for them, thanks to the rightwing Supreme Court: defending abortion rights. It’s a popular issue for the Democrats, it’s very much part of the larger theme of defending democracy and individual rights, and the Democratic position on abortion-rights is also popular with Republican voters, although Biden isn’t likely to win over any significant number of the core Republican base on that issue alone.
The Biden Administration also has to make its case well on economic issues. It actually has a good basis to do so with high employment and a generally healthy economy. But high housing costs are hitting younger voters particularly hard, and the Democrats need to find credible ways of addressing that.
A spreading war in the Middle East that draws in the US military much more directly would be bad for Biden’s reelection bid. And aside from the screaming moral and international-law issues involved, the sooner a real ceasefire happens in Israel’s war on Gaza, the better for Biden’s reelection chances.
The war on Gaza problem
There will be plenty of drama and surprises before Election Day this coming November. Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti make the important point in a recent broadcast that younger voters have been particularly appalled by the carnage Israel is wreaking in Gaza.12 One of Biden’s trademark qualities is his ability to convey empathy. But his effectively unconditional support of Bibi Netanyahu’s rogue government in the current war on Gaza doesn’t look very empathetic at all. And for anyone actually paying attention to such things, it makes the Administration’*s rhetoric about human rights and the “rules-based international order” sound cynical. Which may be a more important factor for younger voters than for older ones who have already been engaged with politics from the Cold War to the End of History to the War on Terror. The latter group may be disgusted with the hypocrisy and cynicism as well but are also more jaded to them. For better or worse.
There is a good chance that Israel’s current military actions may still be active on Election Day, based on current statements from Netanyahu’s government. And that could have real effect in some key swing states. Akbar Shahid Ahmed of HuffPost recently noted:
I think we have to see the conversation about the [casualty] numbers — which was truly shocking to observers and deeply hurtful to Palestinians, not to mention millions and millions of people who are sympathetic to them — in the context of Biden having this old-school approach, in which for years and years it’s been very common among certain intensely pro-Israel figures to treat any Palestinian claim as spurious or potentially propagandistic.
That’s just how he thinks, so I don’t think we’ll see a walk back in public. I think privately, the president does not want to lose whatever Muslim support he still retains, particularly in key states like Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. In terms of the internal dynamics around it, that was a breaking point for a lot of people inside the government [who are dissenting internally against the policy], and not just at the State Department.13 [my emphasis]
Biden has continued with his career-long assumption that unstinting support of Israel in whatever actions they take is good politics. But it could really come back to bite him in the general election among young voters and Muslim-American voters in a few key states.
Biden speaks at Valley Forge ahead of Jan. 6 anniversary. NBC News YouTube channel 01/06/2024. <https://www.youtube.com/live/0F10bey4b2Q?si=YMWRQZbIzGz7v6Za> (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Biden’s first campaign speech of the 2024 election year. AP News 06.01.2024. <https://apnews.com/article/biden-speech-valley-forge-trump-campaign-bda2293cac2b30e49157c2e6fb256d64> (Zugriff: 2024-06-01).
Where were you on Jan.6 2021?. Democrats Abroad YouTube channel 01/06/2024. (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Congressman Jamie Raskin talks to Democrats Abroad on J6 anniversary. Democrats Abroad YouTube channel 01/06/2024. (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Snyder, Timothy (2024): Trump cannot run for office. Timothy Snyder Substack 12/29/2024. (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Snyder, Timothy (2024): The Pitchfork Ruling. Timothy Snyder Substack 01/01/2024. (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Murphy, Brett & Mierjeski, Alex (2023): Clarence Thomas’ 38 Vacations: The Other Billionaires Who Have Treated the Supreme Court Justice to Luxury Travel. ProPublica 08/10/2023. <https://www.propublica.org/article/clarence-thomas-other-billionaires-sokol-huizenga-novelly-supreme-court> (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Elliott, Justin et. al. (2023): Justice Samuel Alito Took Luxury Fishing Vacation With GOP Billionaire Who Later Had Cases Before the Court. ProPublica 06/20/2023. <https://www.propublica.org/article/samuel-alito-luxury-fishing-trip-paul-singer-scotus-supreme-court> (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Perry, Mitch (2023): FL Democrats won’t have a vote in presidential primary in ’24; what about voters in other states? Florida Phoenix 12/11/2023. <https://floridaphoenix.com/2023/12/11/fl-democrats-wont-have-a-vote-in-presidential-primary-in-24-what-about-voters-in-other-states/> (Accessed: 2024-09-01).
Kurtzleben, Danielle (2023): Why Trump's authoritarian language about 'vermin' matters. NPR 11/17/2023. <https://www.npr.org/2023/11/17/1213746885/trump-vermin-hitler-immigration-authoritarian-republican-primary> (Accessed: 2024-07-01).
Werner Krause et. al. (2022): Copying the far right doesn’t help mainstream parties. But it can boost the far right. The Guardian 04/13/2022. <https://www.theguardian.com/world/commentisfree/2022/apr/13/copying-far-right-doesnt-help-mainstream-parties> (Accessed: 2024-11-01).
Obama PANICS As Biden Campaign Flails. Breaking Points YouTube channel 01/08/2024. <> (Accessed: 2024-09-01).
Ahmed, Akbar Shahid (2024): Joe Biden Is Still Giving Unrestricted Support to Israel’s War on Gaza. Jacobin 01/06/2024. <https://jacobin.com/2024/01/joe-biden-antony-blinken-jake-sullivan-benjamin-netanyahu-gaza-israel-palestine> (Accessed: 2024-07-01).