Why Democrats are losing faith in Joe Biden

The president hasn’t been given an easy run by the media. Nevertheless, he needs to do more if he has a hope of getting through the November midterms unscathed, writes John Bowden

Joe Biden at a White House event on Tuesday (Getty)

At a certain point, the White House is going to need to stop blaming Joe Biden’s problems on the media.

Every White House is entitled to bash the press to some extent, and Biden – like many presidents before him – has good reason to complain about a lot of the coverage he has faced. Even before he took office, right-wing media was painting him as an illegitimate leader and the result of a stolen election – or, in the case of Fox News, playing footsie with politicians who did.

Now, we’re a year and a half into the Biden presidency and the gravest threat posed to his chance at reelection is no longer Donald Trump, who despite publicly hinting at plans to run and lording over a massive fundraising stash is now at a historically weak position with independent voters. The biggest threat to Biden 2024 is Biden 2022: A weak, ineffective president who is flip-flopping on issues, battling staff who constantly undermine and walk back his remarks, and seemingly unable to get his legislative agenda through two chambers of Congress controlled by his own party.

This past week was another dour one for the White House, which remains adrift at sea following the landmark Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v Wade and end federal abortion protections for millions of Americans. Progressives are hammering the White House to do more, like open abortion clinics on federal land, but nothing decisive has yet been done.

A new CNN report in the wake of the decision outlined just how low the White House’s standing is with both its biggest boosters in the celebrity world as well as on Capitol Hill. “Debra Messing was fed up,” reads CNN’s jolting analysis of a recent call between White House officials and influencers. “Messing said she’d gotten Joe Biden elected and wanted to know why she was being asked to do anything at all, yelling that there didn’t even seem a point to voting.”

Ouch. Those aren’t the feelings of someone who is getting the White House message that “Roe is on the ballot” in November.

We’re 124 days out from the midterm elections. If Biden is going to take control of both his party and the messaging on its response to the end of Roe, he needs to act fast.

Yours,

John Bowden

Washington DC correspondent