(Fwrd Axis) — When he was sworn into office on January 20, 2021, President Joe Biden promised Americans he would heal a divided and wounded nation after four years of chaos under his predecessor. Now, with the midterms expected to hand Democrats a big loss, is his call for unity falling on deaf ears?
With his approval ratings near 40 percent, Americans dealing with high inflation, and the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, the country is feeling somewhat pessimistic about the direction things are going. Most recently, the President signed the bipartisan gun legislation into law, making it the most sweeping gun bill to become law in over 26 years.
Biden had support from 13 Republicans and all 50 Democrats to get the bill passed, marking a rare time in his presidency he had bipartisan support.
“When it seems impossible to get anything done in Washington, we are doing something consequential,” Biden said after signing the bill. “If we can reach a compromise on guns, we ought to be able to reach a compromise on other critical issues, from veterans’ health care to cutting-edge American innovation to so much more.”
However, his hopes of bipartisan support for his agenda seem far-fetched and out of the realm of possibility.
The President previously tried to get Republicans on board with his $1.9 trillion dollar relief “American Rescue Plan” package, which included $1,400 stimulus checks for eligible Americans, money for small businesses, and over $400 billion for vaccinations. Republicans quickly shot down the bill, citing its hefty price tag, and the bill passed without a single Republican vote in support.
Is Biden’s call for unity all but dead?
Republicans wrote a letter to Biden, asking to meet with him about concerns they had with the bill. The President responded by meeting with eight Republican senators for nearly two hours but later said the meeting did little to change his mind about making any alterations to his proposed plan.
More recently, President Joe Biden has begun to realize his calls for unity may just not be listened to with this group of Republicans.
Why? The answer is simple. Republicans are focused on the 2022 midterm elections and the 2024 presidential election, they don’t want to do anything to hurt their base or lose voters, despite how critical it may be.
When it came to the overturning of Roe v. Wade, progressive Democrats have criticized Biden over a lack of fire in responding to states banning abortion after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade on June 24. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) called on the White House to open abortion clinics on federal land but the administration has said this is not something they are considering.
“Trump wasn’t my favorite but it’s not like we are doing better under Biden,” Nancy Pena, a Biden voter in 2020, said of the current state of the country.
So, while his heart was in the right place and he tried to unite the two parties, the truth of the matter is both sides may be too far apart to ever truly come together. Biden knows now that his call for unity while being the right thing for the country, is falling on deaf ears.
