Biden Helps the “Orange Peril”
American voters are in quite the pickle: a Biden/Trump rematch.
During last week’s SCOTUS address, President Joe Biden made it clear that Donald Trump poses a greater peril to the U.S. than Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, Ali Khamenei, Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, all rolled into one.
In the WSJ, Walter Russell Mead frets about Joe Biden’s failure in even trying to unify America in the face of proliferating foreign threats than on launching his re-election campaign against the “Orange Peril.”
An Incompetent Foreign Policy
Joe Biden’s big mistake, offers Mr. Mead, was not explaining why the world situation has become “dramatically worse on his watch” and what and how he intends to do about the “grim slide.”
Even if Mr. Biden is 100% correct about the danger Mr. Trump poses to American democracy, voter concerns about the competence of the Biden foreign policy may end up helping Mr. Trump return to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Voters somehow survived four years of a Trump Whitehouse. As the world continues to slide into a worldwide conflict, Joe. Biden’s approach to foreign threats is not inspiring:
- A Feb. 21 Quinnipiac poll showed 60% of respondents disapproving of the president’s foreign policy, with 36% approving. The poll found 62% disapproved of his response to the Israel-Hamas war, and 63% disapproved of his handling of the situation at the Mexican border.
- An Associated Press/NORC poll conducted in late January found only 38% of voters approved of how Mr. Biden is handling “the U.S. relationship with China.”
- A February Harvard CAPS-Harris poll got similarly dismal results, with 61% calling Mr. Biden’s Iran policy “unsuccessful” and 71% wanting tougher policies on the southern border.
Biden does not seem to realize that as the world situation gets hotter, voters care more about foreign policy. The number of Democrats who pointed to foreign policy outside of immigration as a major priority more than doubled from Dec. 2022 to Dec. 2023, continues Mr. Mead.
On domestic issues, the president can reasonably hope that nine months of continued prosperity along with cooling inflation will change public perceptions about his leadership.
When it comes to world events, the outlook is darker. Even if Congress approves the president’s aid request for Ukraine, Russia is unlikely to suffer major defeats before the U.S. election. The situation at America’s southern border is likely to remain an open sore. The Middle East is unlikely to bring Mr. Biden much joy, and the risk of more war that requires deeper American involvement is real. Xi Jinping will continue to test America and its allies. From Venezuela to North Korea, the potential for bold moves by bad actors is disturbingly high, and it isn’t clear how much the administration can do to minimize these risks.
Even if Mr. Biden is right, and there were no better choices available than the ones he has made, this approach to foreign policy is a major and quite possibly fatal political mistake. It tells voters that four more years of Mr. Biden means four more years of widening war, growing threats and more border chaos. When the world situation is bad and getting worse, you want to be a change candidate.
Mr. Mead points out that against this background Joe Biden’s rhetorical strategy in his State of the Union address was to insist that his policies are working or would work if Congress would only provide the necessary support.
(Biden) stands by every major foreign-policy decision the administration has made. As Mr. Biden sees it, his administration has the right strategy for Ukraine, and the right approach to the Gaza war, and everything is going fine in the competition with China.
Possibly a Fatal Mistake
Even if Mr. Biden is right, and there were no better choices available than the ones he has made, this approach to foreign policy is a major and quite possibly fatal political mistake. It tells voters that four more years of Mr. Biden means four more years of widening war, growing threats and more border chaos. When the world situation is bad and getting worse, you want to be a change candidate.
Crisis Abroad/Weakness at Home
In reality, many of the president’s problems are the result of his continuing inability to deter our adversaries from steps that undermine our security. The administration’s failure is largely responsible for the sense of crisis abroad and weakness at home.
What Joe Biden Didn’t Do:
- deter Russia from invading Ukraine,
- China from backing Russia or stepping up the pressure on Taiwan and the Philippines
- Iran from heating up its proxy wars against America and our Middle East allies is largely responsible for the sense of crisis abroad and weakness at home.
Many Americans certainly have their doubts about Donald Trump, but that does not mean they want to hear about Joe Biden’s “brilliant” foreign policies.
(Voters) want to know what (Biden would) do differently in a second term, and they want to see signs of those changes now.