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Joe Biden’s fortunes should be looking up. Last week, he became the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee. This week, he was endorsed by Bernie Sanders and Barack Obama. And in the coming months, he’ll be waging his campaign against a president whom most Americans view unfavorably.
And yet. According to my colleague Nate Cohn, a domestic correspondent for The Upshot, Mr. Biden “holds only a narrow and tenuous edge in the race for the Electoral College, if he holds one at all.” So between now and November, how should Mr. Biden try to better his odds? Here’s what people are saying.
Step 1: Ensure a legitimate election
Mr. Biden’s much-touted “electability” will not matter if Democrats can’t secure the November election, Tom Scocca, Slate’s politics editor, writes. Last week’s shambolic primary in Wisconsin — the myriad dysfunctions of which The Times’s editorial board described as “insane” — could be only a preview of what’s to come. “November is still seven months away, and the vote is already breaking,” Mr. Scocca writes.” The candidate of normalcy is the presumptive nominee. But who can count on a normal election?”
The only way to ensure the election’s legitimacy is to guarantee every eligible voter a mail-in ballot, The Times’s editorial board says. Many states already vote mostly or entirely by mail, and their experiments have proved it a secure and reliable practice. But it also has been shown to increase turnout, which the board says is why Republican politicians, including the president, so staunchly oppose Senators Amy Klobuchar’s and Ron Wyden’s current effort to enact it. Recently, Mr. Biden has started calling attention to the issue: On Monday, he pushed for providing all citizens the option to vote both by mail and in person, and said that “Congress would have to be part of that solution.”
Campaign on the coronavirus
The pandemic means that Mr. Biden can no longer afford to be the “anti-Trump” candidate, Julian Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton, writes at CNN. The current administration’s mishandling of the crisis should hurt Mr. Trump’s re-election chances, but only if Mr. Biden can prove that he would do a better job. “He needs to present a plan that will give Americans access to the health insurance they will need to cover the costs born out of this virus,” Mr. Zelizer says. “And with Americans suffering through a crisis echoing the magnitude of the Great Depression, voters will need to hear how he will get this country humming again.”
Mr. Biden seems to be taking some steps in that direction. On Sunday, he wrote a Times Op-Ed outlining his plan to “safely reopen America.” Among the solutions he proposes are continuing social-distancing measures, increasing testing, meeting hospitals’ staffing and equipment needs, and convening “top experts from the private sector” to brainstorm ways of safely and gradually resuming economic activity.
But Mr. Biden’s plan has received criticism for being too vague. Charlie Warzel, an Opinion writer at large for The Times, tweeted:
Stay relevant
In the fog of the pandemic, Mr. Biden has had trouble maintaining his national visibility, as Matt Viser and Annie Linskey report for The Washington Post. While Mr. Trump speaks to millions every day from the West Wing, Mr. Biden has had to scramble for virtual attention from his basement in Wilmington, Del., where his webcam has occasionally gotten the better of him. Some Democrats have privately told him that “his low profile was driving broad concerns that he wasn’t capitalizing on Trump’s widely panned early response,” Mr. Viser and Ms. Linskey write.
But other Democrats think that concerns about Mr. Biden’s virtual campaigning problems are overblown, Ryan Lizza writes in Politico. According to the sources he spoke to, “he can defeat Trump in a general election the same way he has almost won the Democratic nomination: just by being there.”
Convince the skeptics
Mr. Biden must do more to expand his appeal, according to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who pointed to Mr. Biden’s underperformance with young people and Latinos in an interview with The Times. “I don’t think this conversation about changes that need to be made is one about throwing the progressive wing of the party a couple of bones — I think this is about how we can win,” she said.
On Monday, Mr. Biden and Mr. Sanders announced they would form six joint “task forces” on education, climate change, the economy, immigration, health care and criminal justice, a plan that some progressives greeted with tentative approval. Cristina Jiménez, an immigration activist, tweeted:
But in The Boston Herald, Jonah Goldberg argues that it would be a huge mistake for Mr. Biden to alter his platform. Mr. Biden’s image as a moderate is partly what led to his extraordinary comeback; lurching left now would win him few converts, Mr. Goldberg wagers, but would lose him many of the suburban moderates who secured his win. “He’s running as vanilla ice cream,” he writes. “Vanilla ice cream is the most popular flavor not because it’s everyone’s favorite, but because it’s the least objectionable flavor.”
Confront the sexual assault allegation
On March 25, Tara Reade, a former Senate aide to Mr. Biden, accused him of sexually assaulting her in 1993. On Sunday, The Times reported on her story, which a friend said Ms. Reade recounted to her at the time of the alleged assault. Mr. Biden’s campaign unequivocally denied the accusation, and former Senate colleagues of Ms. Reade said they did not recall talk of the alleged episode.
Ms. Reade’s claim is a real liability for Mr. Biden, Alexander Sammon writes in The American Prospect. While he allows that Ms. Reade’s allegations may be untrue, he stresses that they are “extremely serious” and should not be ignored — nor will they be by the president. “Biden will have to answer these questions eventually, and once it comes out of Trump’s mouth, the media is guaranteed to cover it,” Mr. Sammon says. “The longer Biden waits, the more power he gives over to Trump to dictate the terms.”
But it’s also possible that Ms. Reade’s allegations won’t hinder Mr. Biden’s chances, according to Lara Brown, the director of the Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University. “In this situation, I do think most Democrats are going to say to themselves, even if Biden is tarnished, Donald Trump is far worse. So on a relative scale, this isn’t even an issue to be discussed,” she told The Lily, a publication owned by The Washington Post.
Still, some voters say the onus is on Mr. Biden and his supporters to set their minds at ease. Sarah Ann Masse, one of the many women who accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual misconduct, told The Lily that she was daunted by the choice of what to do when it comes to the general election. “I don’t know how to proceed, because it is an agonizing situation.”
[Related: “When Will We Get To Vote For A President Who Hasn’t Been Accused Of Sexual Assault?”]
Do you have a point of view we missed? Email us at debatable@nytimes.com. Please note your name, age and location in your response, which may be included in the next newsletter.
MORE ON BIDEN’S PATH FORWARD
“What America Needs Next: A Biden National Unity Cabinet” [The New York Times]
“Here’s How Biden Should Move Left on Health Care and Court Sanders Voters” [Slate]
“No, Biden Shouldn’t Move Left” [Outside the Beltway]
“Biden’s choice of running mate matters, but not for the reasons you may think” [The Los Angeles Times]
“Bernie Sanders just endorsed Joe Biden. Now comes the hard part.” [The Washington Post]
WHAT YOU’RE SAYING
Here’s what readers had to say about the last debate: Was your state ahead of the coronavirus curve?
Angel from Puerto Rico: “You forgot to mention Puerto Rico. (I know, territories don’t count because we can’t vote to elect the President!)” Puerto Rico’s governor, Wanda Vázquez, issued a stay-at-home order on March 15.
Shelly from Illinois: “Governor Pritzker has done extremely well in getting on top of and managing this crisis. He has however struggled with how to deal with the prison population. In his defense, the worst place is not directly within his purview: the Cook County Jail, about which The Times recently wrote.”
Lynn from New Mexico: “Look at the amazing and timely work our governor, Michelle Lujan Grisham, has done in helping citizens stay safe. Our stay-home advice began in late March. Our schools are closed and we receive briefings as to how well prepared we are with medical supplies and testing.”
Christian from Kansas: “Governor Kelly has been doing an excellent job here.” Kansas was the first state to cancel in-person classes for the remainder of the school year.
Source: Elections - nytimes.com
