Joe Biden has been elected as the President of United States of America. One of the most memorable and important US election concludes, set in the backdrop of unforeseen circumstances created by a raging pandemic. After a year of suffering from the ghastly pandemic, which still continues and financial crisis, Biden was predicted to win the 2020 Presidential Election.
Biden’s mission was always certain, the election was a “battle for the soul of the nation”, he told voters when he announced his candidacy 18 months ago. From depleting campaign coffers to fighting off rival candidates, Biden overcame many hurdles to emerge victorious in this presidential race.
Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Joe Biden briefly worked as an attorney before turning to politics. He became the fifth-youngest US senator in history as well as Delaware’s longest-serving senator in 2017. At the close of his administration, Obama presented Biden with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Two years later Biden launched his campaign for US president.
His father, Joseph Biden Sr, worked cleaning furnaces and as a used car salesman. His mother was Catherine Eugenia “Jean” Finnegan. Biden attended the University of Delaware specializing in History and political science and later attended Syracuse University Law school.
1971: He started his own law firm while serving as a councilman.
1972: In 1972, the Delaware Democratic Party encouraged the 29-year-old Biden to run against the popular Republican incumbent J. Caleb Boggs for the United States Senate. Biden won becoming 5th youngest US senator elected in the nation’s history. Struck by a tragedy before Christmas in 1972, his wife, Neilia Hunter and daughter, Naomi Christina Biden were killed in a car accident severely injuring his 2 sons, Beau and Hunter. Five years later, he tied the knot with Jill Biden and daughter Ashley Biden was born in 1981.
1973 to 2009: He had a distinguished Senate career, earned respect as one of body’s leading foreign policy experts. His many foreign policy positions included advocating for strategic arms limitation with the Soviet Union, promoting peace and stability in the Balkans, expanding NATO to include former Soviet-bloc nations and opposing the First Gulf War.
In later years, he called for American action to end the genocide in Darfur and spoke out against President George W. Bush’s handling of the Iraq War, particularly opposing the troop surge of 2007. He was the chairman of foreign relations for several years. He was an outspoken supporter of tougher crime laws: in 1994, Biden sponsored the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act to add 100,000 police officers and increase sentences for a host of crimes.
1988: He dropped out of presidential elections as two life-threatening brain aneurysms were detected in his brain, leading to two important surgeries. He then returned to Senate after a 7-month recovery period.
2009: Biden became Vice President with Barack Obama elected as the President of US. With his working-class roots, Biden helped the Obama campaign to communicate the message of economic recovery to the blue-collar voters, crucially to swing the states like Ohio and Pennsylvania. While Biden mostly served the role of behind-the-scenes as an adviser to the president, he particularly took active roles in formulating federal policies relating to Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2010, he used his well-established Senate connections to help secure passage of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty between the United States and the Russian Federation
2012: Biden was elected as Vice President again. Later that year, Biden showed just how influential a vice president can be. He was instrumental in achieving a bipartisan agreement on tax increases and spending cuts to avoid the fiscal cliff crisis. With a looming deadline, Biden was able to hammer out a deal with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. On January 1, 2013, the fiscal cliff bill was passed in the Senate after months of tough negotiations.
2015: He rejected President bid in light of personal loss, as Beau lost a battle with brain cancer.
2020: Presidential bid announcement. He became the presumptive Democratic nominee when Sanders ended his campaign in early April, though he also found himself facing new allegations of sexual assault, by a former aide named Tara Reade. After a lengthy period of deliberation, Biden was one of the last candidates to enter the crowded Democratic primary race, which consisted of more than 24 hopefuls at its peak.
Campaigning and Political Stand:
As his rivals announced policy plans and promised political revolution, Biden premised his campaign on character – his decency, his empathy and his perceived electability against a president whom Democrats wanted to defeat. Choosing Kamala Harris as the vice-presidential candidate, Biden definitely scored a win with the Indian-American supporters and garnered a positive response with a female Vice-Presidential candidate. Biden banked his hope on private fundraisers and was outraised financially by other candidates in the initial results, but Biden’s huge African-American support base in South Carolina revived his candidature. Trump suffered a major backlash in the form of the COVID-19 outbreak and its mismanagement by the administration which proved to be a watershed moment in these monumental elections in the US history.
The official website JoeBiden.com covers almost every diaspora and targeting the Democrat supporters by raising a utopian picture of racial equality, more jobs, sustainable development with a heavy emphasis on innovation and clean energy. Biden comes from a working-class background and can thus strike a chord well with the blue-collar population well in contrast to Trump who was born in riches and quite famous for his extravagant indulgences.
The working class is increasingly veering towards Biden in lieu with the promises of support to small entrepreneurship, reversing Trump’s tax cuts for corporations and introducing tax reforms, develop a better caregiving and education workforce, and also supporting abortion-reform laws. They also propose setting up Pandemic Testing Board and US Public Health Jobs Corps to deal with the COVID-19 while simultaneously highlighting Trump’s inefficiency to reduce the blow of the same. They also plan to step up PPE kit, masks, face shields and sanitizer production by fully utilising the Defence production Act and better equip the most hard-hit regions. Additionally, plan on curbing gun violence, to strengthen rural development and LGBTQ equality. In foreign policy, Biden like Trump does not wish to divert any more domestic funds on foreign wars.
The Biden administration might not be able to reverse all decisions taken during the Trump regime. As noted by Vijay Gokhale (Ex Indian ambassador to China and Foreign Secretary) President Trump has been good for India in terms of foreign policy, less so in terms of economic policy. If he is re-elected, India can expect more robust cooperation in foreign policy and security areas but Delhi should equally be prepared for the Trump administration to ratchet up pressure on trade and to tighten rules on immigration.
He emphasised, “With Biden, India and the US might return to a more balanced re-engagement on trade and immigration but should be prepared for a more accommodative policy on both Pakistan and China than Trump’s. Whoever is the next occupant of the White House, the way Americans vote on November 3, 2020, will shape American policy and politics for years to come.”