2024 Will Be Different, Even If It's the Same

This morning, President Biden announced that he would run for reelection with this video:

Axios’ take on the announcement is that it’s a “case against a Trump restoration.” Reporting suggests Biden is running because he believes he’s the one who can beat Trump again. However, if it’s Trump in Biden’s sights, this video misses the mark.

The video is centered around the idea of freedom, though it interestingly does less than some Democrats have previously done to move the freedom discourse beyond one of rights. The only direct economic argument I caught in the video is on Medicare/Social Security, but Trump has been attacking other Republicans for their desire to cut those programs.

The clear issue focus of the video is on issues like abortion, LGBT rights and some of the new “culture war” issues like school libraries. Now, I’ve been clear that abortion politics has radically changed since Dobbs. Much of what I wrote about the issue prior to Dobbs is no longer politically valid—it’s a different environment. Democrats, unfortunately in my view, can go further to the left on this issue with less risk.

That said, even though it was Trump’s appointed judges that overturned Roe, I’d be wary of thinking that arguments on the culture wars will be as effective against Trump. He’s already got Susan B. Anthony List (and his former VP!) arguing he’s not conservative enough on the abortion, something that may (may!) hurt him in the primary, but could help him in a general election. You can make rational arguments about Trump has a puppet for right-wing social conservatives, but I’m just not sure they stick, even after four years of his presidency.

Trump and Biden are both confounding in this way. Their political actions suggest that they are completely bought into one side of divisive social issues, but because of their history, many voters simply do not believe it. Their profile runs counter to it. No matter what Donald Trump does as president or proposes as a candidate, to many voters he’ll always be the guy on the cover of Playboy, the New Yorker, the self-aggrandizing businessman whose only principle is profit and whose only guide is his ego. Mike Pence said a few days ago that “defending the unborn, first and foremost, is more important than politics.” If it helped him, I’m sure Trump would say that, but many voters would doubt that he meant it. Similarly, many voters just will not believe that an 80 year-old Catholic from Scranton who started the century voting for late-term abortion bans and the Defense of Marriage Act, is really bought into the same cultural outlook as a 19 year-old YouTube influencer. Both Trump and Biden are divisive with different slices of America, but their success lies in how they, as people, confound what the primary narrative is against their party, not as a matter of policy, but of personal profile and disposition.

Now, these announcement videos have come to be seen as significant primarily for political watchers and fundraising, not necessarily for setting the message you want voters thinking about on Election Day. However, if this is the message Biden wants to take into a general against Trump, or any other Republican, it will be less Biden 2020 and more Buttigieg 2020. It was Buttigieg who received headlines for his desire to “take back the idea of freedom” for Democrats in 2019. There was little direct talk of normalcy or unity in this announcement video. Has there been a decision that those arguments are not viable for an incumbent?

I don’t think so, even though neither idea can be pitched in quite the same way in 2024. I think this announcement video is primarily about raising money from progressives, and stirring up trouble in the GOP primary. We’ve got a long way to go in this campaign. Just don’t expect a replay of 2020.

Tim Scott

Do you know who is running as Biden 2020? Senator Tim Scott.

Watch this video of Scott announcing his exploratory committee:

Obviously, Scott has a very different political outlook and policy views, but it seems striking—dare I say, intentional—that Scott would reference the “soul” of the country in the opening minute of this video.

I view Scott as the first candidate in this race to position his (potential) campaign as something more than a reaction to Trump. This is a message that he could conceivably take through a primary and into the general without much adjustment. Like Biden (in 2020 and in this new announcement video), Scott is trying to balance the idea that there are real, malevelolent threats out there, with a confidence that there remains a majority of Americans who speak for America itself, and can deliver the verdict that America remains good at its core.

When Trump isn’t at the center of Republican politics, I think we’re seeing there remains the capacity for Republican politics to still have at least appear as though it is about ideas. Scott’s making a real argument in this video that you can challenge and unpack. Chris Christie is leveling charges of principle at Gov. DeSantis.

Alas, Trump remains the frontrunner. What does that tell us?