Joe Biden has been one of America’s most consequential presidents, as well as a dear friend and partner to me. Today, we’ve also been reminded — again — that he’s a patriot of the highest order.
Sixteen years ago, when I began my search for a vice president, I knew about Joe’s remarkable career in public service. But what I came to admire even more was his character — his deep empathy and hard-earned resilience; his fundamental decency and belief that everyone counts.
Since taking office, President Biden has displayed that character again and again. He helped end the pandemic, created millions of jobs, lowered the cost of prescription drugs, passed the first major piece of gun safety legislation in 30 years, made the biggest investment to address climate change in history, and fought to ensure the rights of working people to organize for fair wages and benefits. Internationally, he restored America’s standing in the world, revitalized NATO, and mobilized the world to stand up against Russian aggression in Ukraine.
More than that, President Biden pointed us away from the four years of chaos, falsehood, and division that had characterized Donald Trump’s administration. Through his policies and his example, Joe has reminded us of who we are at our best — a country committed to old-fashioned values like trust and honesty, kindness and hard work; a country that believes in democracy, rule of law, and accountability; a country that insists that everyone, no matter who they are, has a voice and deserves a chance at a better life.
This outstanding track record gave President Biden every right to run for re-election and finish the job he started. Joe understands better than anyone the stakes in this election — how everything he has fought for throughout his life, and everything that the Democratic Party stands for, will be at risk if we allow Donald Trump back in the White House and give Republicans control of Congress.
I also know Joe has never backed down from a fight. For him to look at the political landscape and decide that he should pass the torch to a new nominee is surely one of the toughest in his life. But I know he wouldn’t make this decision unless he believed it was right for America. It’s a testament to Joe Biden’s love of country — and a historic example of a genuine public servant once again putting the interests of the American people ahead of his own that future generations of leaders will do well to follow.
We will be navigating uncharted waters in the days ahead. But I have extraordinary confidence that the leaders of our party will be able to create a process from which an outstanding nominee emerges. I believe that Joe Biden’s vision of a generous, prosperous, and united America that provides opportunity for everyone will be on full display at the Democratic Convention in August. And I expect that every single one of us are prepared to carry that message of hope and progress forward into November and beyond.
For now, Michelle and I just want to express our love and gratitude to Joe and Jill for leading us so ably and courageously during these perilous times — and for their commitment to the ideals of freedom and equality that this country was founded on.
How exactly did the Chinese relationship get so “bad and one-sided”? What would you have liked to see?
China repeatedly and flagrantly violated WTO rules, imposed restrictions on US companies, pushed US companies out of the Chinese market, forced technology transfers, forced joint-ventures, nationalized foreign-owned companies, aggressively manipulated currency markets to keep Chinese goods cheap, engaged in dumping to put foreign competition out of business (ex: rare earth metal mining, solar panels).
Obama refused to address any of this. Even obvious things like the postal union rules causing the USPS to lose money subsidizing the import of Chinese products making it cheaper to ship from China than inside the US.
Then there was the whole Fentanyl thing which is very obviously China waging a new opium war against the US.
All this lead directly to the collapse of the Democrats in the midwest and the rise of Trump.
Yes, they do engage in a whole ton of unfair business practices. How do you think we should address this? I agree on the postal subsidies, incidentally.
Regarding fent, it wasn’t a thing yet in 2016.
Obama should have declared globalization dead, accused China of killing it by not playing by the rules, and started fighting the trade war that Trump and Biden have been fighting. If he had done that in 2014 or earlier Trump never would have gotten elected.
He definitely should not have spent his entire second term fighting for the TPP harder than he ever fought for anything prior to Obamacare, rebranding it several times and then finally and laughably insisting that it was his answer to Chinese aggression. “My solution is to globalize even harder.” – Barack Obama
I don’t personally support a trade war, I think it strengthens the Chinese position in the long term by reducing the amount of economic leverage we have over them.
Globalization, whether we like it or not, simply isn’t dead. It came about due to things like airplanes and cargo ships. It’s not feasible to undo this without losing our advantages on the global stage.