A year out, Joe Biden is in trouble
Lesson summary
Hi there everyone, I’m Jeff and this is Plain English, where JR and I help you upgrade your English with current events and trending topics.
Today is Monday, November 6, 2023. On Tuesday, November 5, 2024, Americans will go to the polls to elect—not a new president, but probably an old president. And that person will probably be either Joe Biden, the 81-year-old incumbent, or Donald Trump, his 77-year-old predecessor. And if Biden wants to hold onto his office, he has some real work to do in the next 365 days or so. You’ll hear why in today’s main story.
In the second half of today’s Plain English, you’ll hear what it means to play into someone’s hands, and we have a quote of the week.
This is lesson number 622, so you can find the free transcript at PlainEnglish.com/622. That is all thanks to JR. Let’s get started.
Biden faces uphill battle in bid for re-election
Joe Biden, a Democrat, is almost three years into his first four-year term as president of the United States. He is running for re-election in 2024 and his most likely opponent is Donald Trump. In the last election, Biden won 51 percent of all votes against Trump’s 47 percent. But polls show them tied in a rematch .
America’s presidential elections are not as simple as who wins the most votes nationwide, but this is still very concerning for Biden: a year out , he is in real trouble. Let’s take a look at the challenges he faces on his road to re-election.
First, his age. Biden is going to turn 81 in a few weeks. If he wins a second term, he would begin that second term at age 82 and end it, potentially , at age 86. He is already the oldest president we have ever had. And his age is becoming a factor.
He doesn’t have the same energy in public that he once had. He has fallen in public a few times. Three quarters of American voters think he’s too old to serve.
Trump, for his part , continually hammers Biden for being too old and for being mentally unfit for office. Biden is not a vigorous campaigner. He doesn’t hold huge rallies like Trump does, and he’s not out there meeting voters, shaking hands, and building support. That’s just not his style.
But if he’s not careful, Biden risks playing into Trump’s hands . Yes, he’s old, and he has some physical limitations. But he needs to get out there and show voters that he’s up for the job.
Next, the economy. This is often the most important—some even say it’s the only factor that determines whether presidents get re-elected. Biden can point to several wins on the economic front. Inflation has come down. He and his party have passed major investments in green technology and infrastructure. Unemployment is at a record low.
Just one problem: the economy doesn’t feel good to the average voter. Yes, inflation has come down. But when inflation comes down, prices don’t come down; they just stop increasing as quickly. And wages have not always grown as fast as prices, so many people feel like they’ve had a net decrease in income.
What’s more , interest rates are now much higher, so buying a house or buying a car is more difficult. So while Biden and his team have several big economic wins to sell to voters, voters don’t always feel like they’ve benefitted from his presidency. This may be unfair, but it’s how people feel, many of them.
Illegal immigration is Donald Trump’s biggest issue; it is a huge vote-getter on the right, b. The tragic thing is, solutions don’t win votes, problems do. The flow of migrants across the southern border with Mexico is at a crisis level. Courts and public services are struggling to keep up with the flow of new arrivals.
A president can’t solve major issues like this without the support of Congress, so this is a shared responsibility. Still, Biden and his administration have taken steps to make the asylum process more orderly and humane.
In this, they have succeeded somewhat, and they should get credit for the progress they have made. But the result is more people crossing the border, not fewer.
For Biden, the worst part is that this looks like vindication for Trump. This looks—I am only talking about how it looks—this looks like Trump was right to build barriers and impose harsh, emergency policies at the border. And that’s pulling Biden’s support down.
Biden faces other challenges in the next year. He’ll have to maintain support for the aid the U.S. is sending to Ukraine—and there are already rumblings in Congress about whether this is a good idea or not. And he has a delicate balancing act in the Middle East. He has pledged support for Israel in its war with Hamas. But that could turn unpopular, depending on how harshly Israel conducts its response.
In public, Democrats express confidence that Biden can defeat Trump a second time. Many presidents suffer a slump in their third year, before going on to win re-election.
But still, I think Democrats have reason to be worried. After the 2020 election and its ugly aftermath, Donald Trump seemed politically dead. But now he’s back, and tied with Biden in some national polls. If Biden wants to prevent a second Trump presidency, then he and his team have a lot of work to do in the next 365 days.
A lot can happen in a year. And no president has an easy path to re-election; there are always big challenges. Trump has spent the last three years making public appearances and criticizing Joe Biden; Biden has been busy with his job. So there is still a year of campaigning left. Trump, obviously, has his own problems —he has multiple trials scheduled between now and election day.
So it’s not time to panic. But if you thought there’s no way Trump could return to the White House, then this is your wake-up call.
Quote of the Week
Here’s a quote for you this week. It’s from a former king of Thailand, Bhumibol Adulyadej. He said, “We must use the wrath of nature as our teacher.”
“Wrath” is like anger. So the “wrath of nature” is things like earthquakes, floods, storms, fires, things that like that. “We must use the wrath of nature as our teacher,” says the former king of Thailand Bhumibol Adulyadej.
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