Joe Biden’s rivals in the race for the 2020 Democrat presidential nomination are attacking him from all angles, save one: Biden’s time as Barack Obama’s vice president.
“People are very nostalgic for that time,” an activist told Politico. Among liberal voters, the Obama administration is inextricably entwined with pre-Trump nostalgia. Years after his presidency, Obama remains extremely popular with his base. That is good news for Joe “Malarkey” Biden, who is riding that goodwill toward the Oval Office.
“It’s going to be challenging for progressives to attack that legacy,” said chief executive Yvette Simpson, of the “Democracy for America” PAC. “Because Obama not only is and was so popular, but people are very nostalgic for that time, particularly after a few years of Trump.”
Flashback: How James Woods Encountered, Then Reported Multiple 9/11 Hijackers to the FBI
Trump Rejects Saudi Crown Prince’s Pleas for New U.S. Strikes in Middle East: Report
Trump admin’s fraud crackdown targets foreigners accused of infiltrating U.S. federal programs
Giuliani blasts Mamdani’s 9/11 toxic air blame as buried city records come to light
In pictures: Trump, Bush, and more pay their respects at 9/11 ceremonies across three sites on 25th anniversary
Lone holdout juror in Lindsay Clancy trial was only Black person on the jury, panelist reveals: report
WATCH LIVE: Trump, first lady, Hegseth, and more attend 9/11 memorial at the Pentagon
Sept. 11 in photos: Washington Examiner photographer Graeme Jennings shares his images from the aftermath of 9/11
Trump set to honor 9/11 victims and first responders at Pentagon and more top headlines
The Ghouls Come Out After Erika Kirk Breaks Her Silence on Anniversary of Charlie’s Death
We Forgot 9/11: Then We Swore a Mayor In on the Qur’an – Part Two
25 years later, 9/11 memories endure as nation gathers to honor nearly 3,000 lives lost
Ontario premier wants Republicans to lose House and Senate over Trump’s trade war
The unlucky 13: States bordering Canada are particularly hard-hit by trade war
Wendell Berry, 1934-2026
Cory Booker has called a crime bill that Biden helped write in 1994 “awful” and “shameful.” Bernie Sanders has gone after Biden for his support of the Iraq War and NAFTA, while Elizabeth Warren has criticized him as “on the side of the credit card companies.” None of them, however, seem willing to contest any matter from his actual White House tenure, despite Politico noting the left has plenty of issues with the Obama administration’s legacy:
For years, left-wing activists have disapproved of the Obama administration’s management of the economic crash, opioid crisis, immigrant deportations, and ill-fated attempts to compromise with Republicans. But many believe it would be political suicide for progressive presidential candidates to question Obama’s record at length, even in the service of defeating Biden.
Sean McElwee, the co-founder of the left-wing think tank Data for Progress, had an arch response: “The biggest weaknesses Biden has, for the most part, are not things he did in the Obama administration,” he said. “Luckily for progressives, Joe Biden is literally 150 years old, which means he has a half-century of a career otherwise to attack.”
Adam Green, co-founder of Progressive Change Campaign Committee — which recently endorsed Warren over Biden — simply does not think Joe is right for the job. “It’s perfectly consistent to say that President Obama righted the ship and aimed it in a better direction,” he claimed, “but now we have an opportunity to move the ship much further and much faster toward progress.”
“The person to do that is clearly not Joe Biden,” Green added, “as he moves backwards on issues ranging from the Hyde Amendment to NAFTA to a ‘middle ground’ on the existential climate crisis.”
Flashback: How James Woods Encountered, Then Reported Multiple 9/11 Hijackers to the FBI
Trump Rejects Saudi Crown Prince’s Pleas for New U.S. Strikes in Middle East: Report
Trump admin’s fraud crackdown targets foreigners accused of infiltrating U.S. federal programs
Giuliani blasts Mamdani’s 9/11 toxic air blame as buried city records come to light
In pictures: Trump, Bush, and more pay their respects at 9/11 ceremonies across three sites on 25th anniversary
Lone holdout juror in Lindsay Clancy trial was only Black person on the jury, panelist reveals: report
WATCH LIVE: Trump, first lady, Hegseth, and more attend 9/11 memorial at the Pentagon
Sept. 11 in photos: Washington Examiner photographer Graeme Jennings shares his images from the aftermath of 9/11
Trump set to honor 9/11 victims and first responders at Pentagon and more top headlines
The Ghouls Come Out After Erika Kirk Breaks Her Silence on Anniversary of Charlie’s Death
We Forgot 9/11: Then We Swore a Mayor In on the Qur’an – Part Two
25 years later, 9/11 memories endure as nation gathers to honor nearly 3,000 lives lost
Ontario premier wants Republicans to lose House and Senate over Trump’s trade war
The unlucky 13: States bordering Canada are particularly hard-hit by trade war
Wendell Berry, 1934-2026
Meanwhile, Biden has drawn a sought-after demographic into his fold: black Americans who supported his “buddy Barack.” Yvette Simpson, head of the progressive Democracy for America PAC acknowledged the risk of alienating that demographic. “Biden’s early advantage among African-Americans has more to do with Obama than Biden. And if you attack that, you start to alienate those voters,” she said.
“Biden is winning, or at least is ahead, because nobody has made the argument that Obama’s policies are the reason that Democrats lost in 2016,” said Matt Stoller, a former Senate Budget Committee aide under Bernie Sanders. “They’re not challenging the fundamental narrative that Joe Biden is running on, which is that Obama did a good job and we need to get back to that.”
“I’ve been bugging the campaigns about it,” he said, but “they’re like, ‘Yeah, yeah, we know, but we don’t have a way to do it.
Story cited here.
