Biden’s Presidency: Assessments Begin
Kick him while he's down?
A majority of Americans — 54 percent — currently view Joe Biden’s presidency negatively.
But as Donald Trump and Jimmy Carter could testify, the American people are fickle, perceptions change, and assessments will continue for 40 years or more. After losing the presidency with just 46.8 percent of the vote in 2020, Trump regained it with 49.9 percent in 2024. Carter lost the presidency in 1980 with just 41 percent of the vote, but has regained popularity since. In 2021, among those 50 and older who could remember Carter’s presidency, he had 56 percent approval. Some 45 percent had no opinion because they couldn’t remember Carter’s presidency.
The tributes to Carter demonstrate that a president does not have to win re-election to make a major impact. Biden and Carter served just four months less than the nation’s greatest president, Abraham Lincoln.
Few swing voters seem to be aware that Biden, in his first two years, had one of the most successful legislative records for a president in history. Under his leadership, Congress passed bipartisan infrastructure investments; the Chips and Science Act;
2024 Brought One of Strongest Job Markets in US History, But Biden Got Little Credit
CNN: The US economy closed out 2024 with another month of massive job growth, adding 256,000 positions in December. The unemployment rate dipped to 4.1% from 4.2%, wrapping up a year that marked a return to pre-pandemic norms, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Friday…The economy added about 2.2 million jobs in 2024, an average of 186,000 jobs per month…The US has now added jobs for 48 months in a row, tying the second-longest period of employment expansion on record….It’s a historic achievement for President Joe Biden: Barring revisions, he’s the first US president to oversee monthly job gains for the entirety of his presidency, according to BLS records that go back to 1939. https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/10/economy/us-jobs-report-december-final/index.html
The majority of the public didn’t give Biden credit for the very strong employment numbers. Voters seemed to credit themselves for getting and keeping jobs, but blamed Biden for high inflation. Prices increased 21 percent since 2020, but the rate of inflation declined steadily in the last two years of the Biden administration, the US Labor Department reported in October.
Timothy Noah on Substack: Bidenomics Was A Success.
No, Biden’s AG Merrick Garland Did Not Let Trump Skirt Justice
Fans of alternative history are likely to produce a narrative suggesting that if Joe Biden’s Attorney General Merrick Garland had done his duty and ordered an aggressive legal case against Donald Trump shortly after taking office, Trump would have been fully convicted before the 2024 election, and voters would have repudiated MAGA. Don’t you believe such nonsense, a New Republic article by a legal scholar asserts.
Biden’s Farewell Address, Along With 15 Other Last Presidential Speeches
Since Harry Truman’s last presidential speech was broadcast on radio and the new medium of television in 1953, American presidents have sought to summarize their accomplishments, reflect on their tenure, sometimes admit mistakes, and issue warnings about growing and future problems. Sixteen farewell addresses by American presidents are here, including that of Joe Biden.
CBS News: “President Biden warned of the rise of an oligarchy in his farewell address, comparing influential billionaires of today to the “robber barons” of 100 years ago. American historian H.W. Brands discusses their influence over government and the American way of life in the 19th century.”
Sarah Pruitt on History.com in 2017 reviewed several presidential farewell addresses, including those of George Washington, Andrew Jackson, Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush.
Historian Heather Cox Richardson summarized Biden’s and put it in context. Click.
Journalist James Fallows, a speechwriter for Jimmy Carter, wrote: The Speech Joe Biden Is Likely to be Remembered For. “For eight minutes, Joe Biden sounded nothing like the president we’ve come to know. He sounded like another president who also boldly stepped out of character when delivering his farewell.”
Before Truman, presidential farewell addresses were not an absolute tradition. George Washington gave perhaps the most memorable warning of “entangling alliances” in foreign affairs and hyper-partisanship in domestic relations. Hyper-partisanship leads to the “ruins of public liberty,” our first president said, and opens the door to an authoritarian who could defy constitutional restraints on power and ignore the rule of law.
In an article for Politico in 2017, John Avlon, author of Washington’s Farewell: The Founding Father’s Warning to Future Generations, explained. Washington believed that “a strong central government led by an honest, energetic executive was essential to a successful democracy,” Avlon wrote.
Jackson’s written farewell address was more than 8,000 words. The paragraphs that appear prescient, more than 20 years before the civil war, were the warnings about the dangers of sectionalism.
Kick Him While He’s Down
Biden is currently undergoing a spate of negative media attention from outlets that have previously been favorable:
Biden’s Legacy: Bad Or Worse? Podcast by NYT columnists.
Biden’s Tarnished Legacy, by Charlie Sykes, The Atlantic.
Good for Black America? By Candace McDuffie for The Root.
Biden’s Over-confidence Undid His Presidency, by Perry Bacon JR. in the Washington Post.
Why Late Regime Presidencies Fail, by Ron Brownstein in The Atlantic.
How Biden Surprised Progressives And Saw FDR As A Role Model
Biden’s presidency is full of major accomplishments. His legacy won’t reflect that. By Sara Pequeño in USA Today.
Four Illusions, Four Deceptions, by Bret Stephens in the NYT.
How Biden’s domestic policy record stacks up against public perception, by the Associated Press.
Goodbye and good riddance, Biden. Americans like me are glad to see Joe go. By Nicole Russell in USA Today.
Biden’s Legacy (NYT)