Joe Biden’s speech to the Democratic National Convention was a bittersweet farewell to America. It was the president’s last prime time opportunity to speak in front of the Democrat faithful who elected him and who then effectively dumped him in favour of Kamala Harris.
Just a month ago, Biden had expected to give the keynote address as the Democratic presidential nominee. Now he was merely a side act in the four day festival of his Vice President Harris. It’s been a huge and rapid fall for the 81-year-old in only a month.
Biden was gracious and all smiles as he bathed in the grateful cheers of a party whose guilt about engineering the coup against him has been wiped away by the stunning early success of Harris in the polls against Donald Trump.
He gave a strident and passionate defence of his presidency to chants of “thank you Joe” and he was generous in his praise for Harris. It was a robust performance under the circumstances.
For the Democrats, Biden’s speech at the convention was always going to be an awkward moment. The party wanted this first night of the four day convention to focus on Biden’s achievements and his legacy but it also wanted to usher him out the door quickly to allow the convention focus on the youthful Harris and the future.
Biden seemed more than happy to comply with their wishes, flying straight out after his speech to holiday in California rather than stay in Chicago to watch the Harris party.
The adulation the Democrat faithful showed Biden during his speech was as much for his decision to abandon the race and hand the torch to Harris as it was for his legacy. Biden and his wife Jill are perhaps the only Democrats left in America who think he could have defeated Donald Trump and served as president for a further four years.
The stubbornly proud Biden maintains, at least publicly, the fiction that he only stepped aside from the race to maintain the unity of the party. Biden’s unspoken implication is that he could have run and defeated Trump and served out his second term except for the panicky and unjustified coup engineered against him by Democrat leaders like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.
Biden is still smarting from the role which Democrat leaders played in the coup against him and has not spoken to Pelosi since that time. He is also angry with Barack Obama for his complicit silence during those turbulent days. As much as Biden would no doubt wish Harris success against Trump, it must still be galling for him to witness the astonishing turnaround in the polls after Harris took over from him as the Democratic nominee. It has proved that they were right and he was wrong.
Yet whether Biden likes it or not, his long term legacy is now closely tied to Harris’ fortunes.
If Harris loses to Trump in November, history will judge Biden more harshly for contributing to her downfall by waiting too long before deciding to quit the presidential race. Biden’s late abdication in the race gave Harris barely 100 days to run a campaign and defeat Trump.
But if Harris wins in November, Biden’s epic miscalculation about his age and his ability to serve a second term will be largely forgotten. Only a Harris victory will ensure that Biden’s legacy as president will be judged without the caveat that he helped to deliver a second term in the white house to Trump.
Biden used his convention speech to defend his record, including his management of the pandemic, his legislative achievements and handling of foreign crises such as Ukraine and Gaza.
He characterised Harris as his loyal Vice Presidential partner, implying that she also deserved credit for the achievements of his administration.
But Harris is already seeking to distance herself from some of the failures of the administration, especially border security and cost of living pressures. She is seeking to chart her own policies without appearing disloyal to Biden which will be a delicate balance to strike. For Biden, the convention was perhaps the last time that he will speak to such a large national audience before his presidency ends in five months. He will use his remaining time as president to try to improve his legacy, but with a deadlocked Congress he will need to rely on foreign policy wins, such as a peace deal in Gaza. But the best protection for Biden’s long term legacy is if Harris defeats Trump. At least then he will not be blamed for his part in her downfall.
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