Progressives Will Largely Hold Their Noses And Vote For Biden (Who Isn't As Bad As Trump)

At this point I don't know anyone-- aside from myself-- who's still refusing to vote for Biden. No one I know-- not one person-- likes Biden or thinks he'll make a good president. Few expect him to even be a mediocre president. Most everyone I know expects him to be one of the worst... but not as bad as Trump, who is the worst... and beyond. But everything in Biden's decades in elected office says he'll be the worst Democrat in the presidency since, perhaps, James Buchanan, who, tragically, took office in 1857. The only hope for just a plain ole mediocre Biden presidency would be if he sits down in a rocking chair on the day after he's inaugurated, sucks his thumb for four years and lets Obama run the show.

On Tuesday night, though with no success, Trump tried splitting the progressive base away from the virulently anti-progressive Biden. Progressives know what a sack of shit Biden is and know that Trump is infinitely worse. Most people I know, say they will voted for Biden anyway and fully expect to start fighting his and his Wall Street "Nothing Will Change" agenda with all they have as soon as he takes office. Yeah, yeah.

With Trump's prodding, Biden went out of his way Tuesday night not just to distance himself from Medicare-for-All, but to make sure Americans know his plans for a faux public option are mostly faux and will in no way discomfit his friends (and donors) in the health insurance industry. He also bad-mouthed the Green New Deal and gave progressives every reason in the world to sit on their hands next month-- and then he called Trump a "clown" and told him to "shut up" and... some-- in not all-- was forgiven.

Tuesday night, Biden boasted about beating Bernie. Wednesday morning I got an e-mail from Bernie asking me to send a $500 contribution before the end of the day so he can continue trying to help elect the man I won't even vote for. "This is the most important election in the modern history of our country," he wrote. "It is absolutely critical we do all we can to defeat Donald Trump, the most dangerous president in modern American history." Everyone agrees and, like I said, everyone I know plans to hold their noses and vote for Biden.

NBC News' Sahil Kapur reported on Wednesday that a spokesman for the Justice Democrats, Waleed Shahid, responded to Trump's naked attempts to split the Democrats by saying that "Trump wants to play this ridiculous 'Gotcha, you and Bernie disagree!' game as if the entire primary didn’t happen. I think Biden could have tried to articulate his actual policy positions and what he wants to get done. But it was hard to articulate anything in that debate."

Shahid said the progressive movement’s role is to “elect a president closer to your views” and “broaden the scope of what's considered politically possible” with a mix of protest and pressure.

Biden's eagerness to distance himself from the left is reflective of his strategy to win the election by attracting moderate-minded seniors and white college graduates, rather than bet the race on turning out younger or irregular voters in Barack Obama's winning coalitions. Millennials and Generation Z voters are less enthused about Biden, and their voting patterns are difficult to predict.

For now, Trump is a unifying force masking genuine tensions between an older, moderate faction that runs the party and a rising base of young progressives seeking to reshape Democratic priorities. The debate is more reflective of a coffee table conversation on policy than a bloody knife fight threatening to wound the party.

I am not upset with Biden,” said Brian Fallon, a veteran Democratic operative who now runs Demand Justice, a group fighting for a more progressive judiciary and Supreme Court. He said he interpreted Biden's nonanswer on whether he'd support adding Supreme Court seats as a sign that it was “on the table” if he's elected president.

Fallon said Biden wanted to isolate variables and make his opposition to Barrett be about the proximity to the election, but said Biden “oversold it” by calling her a “very fine person.”

Ben Wessel, the executive director of the youth-focused progressive advocacy group NextGen America, dismissed the “noise” around Biden's Green New Deal remarks, and instead praised Biden’s plan for 100 percent carbon-free electricity by 2035.

Progressive activists say they view the contest as one between a reluctant ally and a mortal enemy. While some distrust Biden’s moderate instincts, they see him as willing to listen and adopt some of their ideas. Some take the optimistic view that he’d embrace more liberal ideas if elected.

“I don’t think most of our people give a shit what it’s called as long as it gives us a fighting chance at a safe and livable climate,” Wessel said. “The young people we’re talking to know that we’re going to have to push Biden to be even stronger on the issues once he’s in office, but that they’ve got to get him in the White House first.”

On Twitter, Ocasio-Cortez dismissed former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway’s attempts to highlight Biden’s opposition to the Green New Deal, contrasting him favorably with Trump, who she said “doesn’t even believe climate change is real.”

A Biden adviser said that if Trump’s strategy was to drive a wedge between Biden and progressives, it only backfired, as Biden held firm to his more moderate lane of the party and used the high-profile moment to undercut Trump's strategy of portraying Biden as a Trojan horse of the radical left.

Campaigning Wednesday in Alliance, Ohio, Biden addressed questions about his differences with the left, reiterating his opposition to Medicare for All and saying his plan is "the Biden Green Deal."

Biden said Trump keeps trying to run against "somebody other than me."

"I've said to the left, to the right, to the center exactly where I am on each of these issues," Biden told reporters. "So I'm not worried about losing the left, right or center of the party. This is a big party."

If Biden is elected, the governing tension could become a theme of his presidency.

Shahid said the modern left will pressure Biden the same way contemporary movements pressured Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson to be bolder.

"Lincoln was not an abolitionist, FDR was not a socialist or trade unionist, and LBJ was not a civil rights activist," he said. "In fact, they took great steps to distance themselves from those movements."

Many of the candidates endorsed by Blue America were Bernie or Elizabeth Warren supporters during the primaries. None were Biden supporters. All of them oppose Trump and I believe all of them plan to vote for Biden while sticking to their own progressive agendas. The first one I reached was Rockland/Westchester congressional candidate Mondaire Jones, a very independent-minded progressive. "The left in recent years has never shied away from a fight with members of the Democratic Party," he told me, "and I see no reason why we won’t flex our newfound muscle in a Biden-Harris administration. Biden and Harris would be working with the most progressive Congress we’ve seen, and I’m ready to make sure they’re sticking to their promises, and I'll be part of the effort to push them to be more in line with progressive values."

Similarly, West Virginia progressive, Cathy Kunkel, told me that her campaign "has been consistent from the beginning in fighting for an economy that works for all West Virginians-- for Medicare for All, well-funded public education and revitalizing our economy as the coal industry continues to decline. Our campaign will continue to advocate for those issues, and highlight the fact that Congressman Alex Mooney has done nothing in the last six years to address these urgent needs, regardless of the dynamics in the presidential race."

Nate McMurray, the populist candidate running in New York's "reddest" district (which he came within a handful of votes of winning in 2018) has a very clear vision when it comes to the elections next month. "Listen," he told he this morning, "I'm way more progressive than Joe Biden. I support him as the Democatic nominee but there are issues we really differ on. It's about the average Americans who need access to good quality, affordable healthcare, safety and secured rights for minorities and LGBTQ Americans. It's about being able to say and mean that Black Lives Matter and not having a President who just tells white supremacy groups to 'stand by' and refuses to renounce white supremacy outright. The American people and our democracy cannot take another four years of Trump. Will I fight for more progressive policies in Washington than Biden stands for? You bet I will. But we need him in office right now to restore our faith in humanity, and repair all the damage done to the country. A Trump win will tear the country apart."