The Political Past of Joseph R. Biden Jr.
2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden, speaks during an event on Thurs., Nov. 14, 2019 at Los Angeles Trade-Technical College, in Los Angeles, Calif. (Yasamin Jafari Tehrani | The Corsair)
Joe Biden is no stranger to the White House. He spent eight years as vice president during the Obama administration, from 2009 to 2017. Come January 20, 2021, Biden will be inaugurated as the 46th President of the United States.
While this is the first time he has won a presidential election, Biden has run twice before. His other two attempts at the presidency were in 1977 and 2008, the latter in which he was then selected as the vice presidential candidate for then Democratic Nominee Barack Obama.
Biden’s career in government spans back to 1973, when he became a senator for Delaware. He was sworn into the senate two weeks after his wife, Neilia Hunter, and daughter, Naomi Biden, had passed away in a car crash. The swearing in ceremony took place in the Hospital Chapel in Delaware as his sons Beau and Hunter were recovering from the accident. Throughout his time in senate, Biden was given the nickname “Amtrak Joe”, as he commuted everyday from his home in Delaware to his office in Washington via train, in order to be there for his sons. He was re-elected six times, and only resigned in 2009 in order to take on his vice presidential role.
One of the first defining issues of Biden’s career was busing. In 1954, Brown v. the Board of Education passed, a court ruling that decided “separate” education is “not equal.” However, ten years after this was decided, few schools had made changes to promote equality. Slowly, legislation was passed to “bus” students into different school districts to create a more even playing field. After previously running on a pro-bussing platform, Biden began to support anti-bussing legislature and went as far as proposing an unconstitutional piece of legislation that wouldn’t let federal judges bus students unless they could ‘prove discrimination was occurring.’
Before Kamala Harris became Biden’s vice president, she ran against him in the presidential primaries. During a debate, she brought up that “there was a little girl in California who was a part of the second class to integrate her public schools and she was bused to school every day. And that little girl was me.” While Joe Biden responded to say that he never opposed busing overall — just busing enforced by the Department of Education — the New York Times cited several reasons to prove that this is categorically untrue.
During his 36 years as Senator, Biden supported many policies considered to be controversial by Democrats. Biden supported an amendment to the Constitution in 1981 that would enable states to overturn Roe v. Wade, telling reporters with The Washingtonian that “Roe v. Wade went too far” in 1974. Similarly, up until last year, Biden stood behind the Hyde Amendment, which famously restricted access to abortion by stripping federal funding for abortion. After receiving criticism from his Democratic rivals during the 2019 primaries, he changed his stance on the Amendment — but clarified, at a Democratic gala in July 2019, that he had "no apologies" for his previous stance.
"If I believe healthcare is a right, as I do, I can no longer support an amendment that makes that right dependent on someone's ZIP code," Biden said.
Biden frequently pushed for more assertive action and funding to expand police and prison systems during the 90s. He worked with former South Carolina senator and segregationist Strom Thurmond to create legislation that increased penalties for drugs, eradicated parole at the federal level, and aimed to limit access to bail. Ronald Reagan, who was president at the time, refused to sign off on the legislation.
Biden has recognized flaws with the original drafting of the bill and has proposed policies that address these consequences, but reformists are unsure how far he will go to amend these issues.
When he was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1991, Biden presided over the hearings between Anita Hill and Clarence Thomas. Clarence Thomas, former President George Bush’s nominee to the Supreme Court, was accused by Anita Hill of sexual assault. Biden led an all-white, all-male Judiciary Committee in grilling Hill about her experience, at the end of which Biden refused to hear corroborating stories from other witnesses and survivors.
Throughout his time in the Obama Administration, Biden did his part in helping pass the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, which guarantees an inexpensive form of health coverage for Americans. In 2017, Obama awarded Biden the Medal of Freedom, the Nation’s highest civilian honor. “I just wanted to get some folks together to pay tribute to somebody who’s not only been by my side for the duration of this amazing journey. But somebody who has devoted his entire professional life to service to this country. The best vice president America’s ever had, Mr. Joe Biden,” said Obama.
Biden announced his run for President on April 25, 2019. He was officially named the Democratic Nominee in August 2020 and selected Kamala Harris as his running mate. On the morning of Nov. 7 it was announced that Biden and Harris had been elected by the American People.
Though former President Donald Trump has yet to agree to a peaceful transfer of power, Biden has already begun putting some of his presidential plans into action. On Monday, Nov. 9, he announced his official coronavirus task force made up of physicians and health experts. This highly differs from the current president’s downplaying of the pandemic, which contributed to the deaths of over 239,000 Americans — and counting.
“Dealing with the coronavirus pandemic is one of the most important battles our administration will face, and I will be informed by science and by experts,” Biden said in a public statement. “The advisory board will help shape my approach to managing the surge in reported infections; ensuring vaccines are safe, effective, and distributed efficiently, equitably, and free; and protecting at-risk populations.”
Biden will be faced with innumerable challenges, following four years of an administration that attempted to erase much of the work done during his run as vice president. He will also take office as the pandemic still rages and racial inequities still exist — as they have since the founding of the United States. Biden has pitched a wide variety of initiatives, including restoring environmental protections and healthcare rights, mending international alliances, and raising the minimum wage. And although Biden took on a “tough-on-crime” stance for the majority of his Senate terms, he now advocates for grand-scale criminal justice reform.
Overall, Democratic voters and those more left-leaning have hope in Biden’s abilities to listen and respond to calls about racial injustice and other issues largely ignored by Trump.
Joe Biden won the White House with a more progressive agendathan most major party presidential candidates over the course of history. While half of the country rejoices at the end of Donald Trump’s presidency, a brief glance into Biden’s background leaves some Americans skeptical of his capabilities as a leader and decision-maker. Though he is a Democratic party member, his voting record aligns him with more moderate Republican beliefs, especially when it comes to issues on equality and war.
