SAUNDERS: Who’s most at fault for Democrats’ big loss? Joe Biden

WASHINGTON

Things got a little testy in the White House briefing room Thursday. It was the first daily briefing since Vice President Kamala Harris lost the presidential election, and reporters wanted to know if President Joe Biden takes responsibility for his starring role in Donald Trump’s big win on Nov. 5.

The short answer is: No.

Let’s go back in time to 2019, when Biden threw his hat into the ring. At the time, the former veep signaled that if he won, he would serve only one term. He saw himself as a “good transition figure” who would steady the ship after Trump’s term and presumably before Biden’s successor. It was a winning message for the Democratic primary and for general election voters.

It turns out Biden was the cheese in a Trump sandwich. In less than four years, he pushed positive public sentiment into negative territory.

Why did Biden dangle his one-term proposition? Because when he took the oath of office at age 78, he was the oldest chief executive in American history.

Trump will be sworn in at the same age, so we’ll have to cross our fingers that he doesn’t show the signs of aging that Biden exhibited, most glaringly during his debate with Trump in June.

Back to the press briefing, which provided an early episode of the finger pointing that inevitably follows an election loss.

Democrats should be angry. They should be angry at Biden.

If Biden had announced he was not running for re-election in 2022, or even 2023, Democrats could have had a robust primary. Instead, they got a too-late announcement in July 2024, after which Biden handed the baton to his veep.

Biden’s late decision was especially unfair to Democrats who weren’t particularly enthusiastic about Harris.

Maybe Harris would have won if she had competed in the primary, but she would have been more seasoned — maybe even forthcoming about her positions on key issues like immigration — and many Democrats already would have voted for her once.

Perhaps a different Democrat would have lost to Trump, too. Thing is, America will never know because Biden’s late pullout rigged the result. And voters were left with the nagging suspicion that the nominee was not the best Democrat for the job.

For his part, Biden is free to believe that he could have won the election if he had not been forced out by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. As Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre pointed out, with a reference to 2020, Biden is the only candidate to beat Trump.

When Biden delivered post-election remarks in the Rose Garden on Thursday morning, he may have told himself he would have won if Pelosi had not interfered.

Biden told America that his situation reflects “the struggle for the soul of America.”

But he’s the guy who opened the border in 2021. He’s the big spender who fueled the inflation that brought so much pain to American families. He was the commander-in-chief when an ill-considered order to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan left 13 American service members dead.

Would Biden have won? No.

Contact Review-Journal Washington columnist Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com. Follow @debrajsaunders on X.