Biden's First Year As President
A look back on the 46th President's first year in office, and all that his administration has(n't) accomplished.
This week marks the end of Biden’s first year as our 46th President. Depending on who you ask, he’s either been one of the worst presidents we’ve ever had or he’s been a breath of fresh air from the Trump years, but almost everyone would agree that Biden has fallen short in at least some ways. From my libertarian-leaning point of view, Biden’s first year in office really hasn’t been much different than the previous four years under Donald Trump, except maybe in rhetoric. To be clear, my intention here is not to unfairly ridicule the President but to critically examine his first year in office while comparing his policies and accomplishments (or lack thereof) to his promises on the campaign trail. I’m sure I’ll also be making occasional comparisons to the policies of his predecessor.
A brief rundown of the main issues Biden campaigned on during 2020 include:
Covid-19
The Economy
Open Schools
Criminal Justice Reform
Decriminalizing Marijuana
Gun Control
Student Loan Forgiveness
Climate Change
Immigration Reform
Improving Relations With U.S. Allies
Ending Forever Wars
Unity
While these do not represent all of the Biden Administration’s goals, I feel like this list includes the key points he focused on during his campaign. While progress has been made on some of these issues, some of that progress has been less than satisfactory, and other issues have yet to be addressed; I would also argue that some of the “progress” Biden wants to see in some of these areas wouldn’t be viewed as an improvement to some people. Let’s go down the list and see where each of these stands today compared to one year ago.
Covid-19
A good place to start on the comparison of Biden’s campaign promises versus his current policies on Covid-19 would be vaccines — or more accurately, vaccine mandates.
Biden entered his term with a goal of vaccinating 100 million Americans within his first 100 days; now, the first year of his presidency is ending with the Supreme Court striking down one of the two vaccine mandates he’s since imposed on U.S. citizens. When you consider the fact that early on in his term Biden publicly stated that he did not intend to mandate the Covid vaccine, it further exposes the contrast of his rhetoric then, compared to his actions now. He did reach his goal of administering 100 million doses within his first 100 days, however, and most recently his administration will be sending Americans free at-home Covid-19 tests and N95 masks; just in time for the end of the current wave.
The first major piece of legislation the Biden Administration managed to get through Congress was the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan. That package was sold as a necessary tool in combating Covid-19, but in reality, the bill had little to do with the virus. However, it did provide the third round of stimulus checks to much of the U.S. population that one could argue might have actually provided some relief to people struggling at the time. Another early action Biden took was rejoining the U.S. to the World Health Organization (WHO) after former President Donald Trump pulled us out of the institution.
Biden also boldly claimed he would beat the virus. One constant factor of his tenure in office so far has been his blaming of politicians like Donald Trump and several Republican governors for prolonging the pandemic because they each generally took a slightly more hands-off approach in their response. At the time of his inauguration, the U.S. had the deadliest month of the pandemic up to that point, with over 79,000 people reported dying. A year later, the virus continues to spread with the omicron variant causing a surge in cases over the last few months. Fortunately, while transmissibility increased with this variant, deaths did not, and this current wave seems to be receding. While the pandemic in January 2022 is clearly not as bad as it was in January 2021, a variant being less lethal isn’t really something the President can take credit for. Despite Biden’s claim to beat Covid-19, the virus is still very much a part of our lives.
The Economy
The economy leading up to 2020 was doing fairly well, and other than the effects we were always going to feel eventually from years of unrestrained government spending, things were on track to stay that way. The pandemic — or more accurately, the government’s response to it — changed that, however. The lockdowns and shelter-in-place orders that took hold of the country that year severely impacted our economy, which prompted the government to print trillions of dollars in an attempt to heal a self-inflicted wound. These were the economic conditions that the Biden Administration inherited; let’s see how the recovery has been so far.
While some aspects of the economy are in better shape than they were a year ago, others are substantially worse. Some things that have improved include the unemployment rate, as well as an increase in jobs taking place last year. However, something that should be acknowledged is the fact that much of that progress was due to the easing of restrictions; the implication being that it’s not really “progress” considering those issues existed mainly because of government interference in the first place.
Some areas that have seen little progression if any, are inflation and supply chain issues. It’s unfair to claim (as some have) that Biden is to blame for the rising inflation we saw at the beginning of his term, but he hasn’t done much to help it. While the government has consistently spent money with little restraint since long before the pandemic, today’s inflation can easily be linked to the spending that took place under the Trump Administration, especially the Covid relief spending during the start of the pandemic.
With that being said, Biden’s consistent desire to spend trillions more since then is a clear sign of his misunderstanding of economic principles. Fortunately, his Build Back Better agenda failed to get through the Senate, and the bipartisan infrastructure bill passed during his first year was significantly scaled back in price from its original proposal. While Biden may not have been to blame for gas prices rising at the beginning of 2021, his continued ignorance of the poor economic effects caused by unfettered government spending does not bode well for the future.
As for supply chains, the situation can’t be blamed squarely on Biden, but he hasn’t solved the problem either. You could make the argument that it’s not something one man can fix on his own, and government intervention, even in attempts to help, often yields poor results. He does carry some blame, however, with one example being his continuation of Trump’s protectionist tariffs; a policy that only increases costs on U.S. consumers and causes an extra burden to solving the problems affecting our supply chains.
Open Schools
The pandemic caused K-12 schools, as well as colleges and universities, to change from in-person classes to virtual learning. This was one of the defining factors of 2020, and in some areas, it continued into the beginning of Biden’s term. While most schools did eventually open back up, the recent omicron-induced wave of cases has caused school districts across the country to unnecessarily revert back to old habits, even in my conservative-dominated community in central Utah. This doesn’t mean progress hasn’t been made on this issue, but the similarities in schooling from then and now are quite disappointing.
Criminal Justice Reform
Joe Biden inherited the Oval Office after a year of civil unrest sparked by the murder of George Floyd at the hands of police officer Derek Chauvin. That year brought the conversation of criminal justice reform to the forefront of U.S. politics. Biden campaigned on pursuing that reform, which always seemed unlikely considering Biden’s history of supporting tough-on-crime policies and Vice President Kamala Harris’ history as a prosecutor.
One of Biden’s earliest hypocrisies was his procrastination to meet with Black Lives Matter at the beginning of his term, despite his earlier support for the group during his campaign. When that meeting eventually did take place, BLM was disappointed with the Biden Administration for their lack of progress on police reform. Specifically, one criticism the group had was that Biden gave states permission to spend unused Covid-19 relief funds on their police departments in an attempt to curb the rising crime rate. Another example of Biden doing little to solve these issues is the fact that more excess military equipment is flowing into local police departments now than under Trump, which should appall advocates of criminal justice reform.
Decriminalizing Marijuana
Another one of Biden’s campaign promises that’s in a similar vein as our last topic is the decriminalizing of marijuana. As stated above, Biden has an extensive history as a drug-warrior, but in recent years he claims his opinions on the subject have evolved. While the President still opposes legalizing the plant, he has instead supported the idea of decriminalizing marijuana and changing it under the Controlled Substances Act from a Schedule I drug where it is now — in the same class as heroin — to Schedule II. While these sentiments are a good sign, there has been very little advancement of these policies, and people all over the country are still serving time for non-violent marijuana convictions every day the President doesn’t use his power of clemency to shorten those sentences.
Gun Control
One area where Biden continues his tough-on-crime mentality is his views on guns. The President has expressed his desire to ban semi-automatic weapons and has called attention to so-called “ghost guns” which are firearms either partially or entirely manufactured at home, a hobby enjoyed by a large portion of law-abiding gun owners. That hobby came under attack earlier in Biden’s term when he instructed the Bureau of Alcohol, Tabacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to implement new regulations to combat homemade firearms. That policy strikes me as somewhat similar to when Donald Trump used the ATF to ban bump stocks during his Administration. Biden also nominated David Chipman to be head of the ATF but withdrew that nomination after he failed to get enough support from the Senate, due to Chipman being a controversial figure as a long-time gun control advocate. Fortunately, no major legislation on gun control passed during Biden’s first year, but that isn’t to say he won’t keep trying over the rest of his term.
Student Loan Forgiveness
Biden entered the Presidency with a promise to forgive $10,000 of student debt for every borrower. While he hasn’t necessarily achieved that goal, his administration has forgiven $15 billion dollars of student loans for hundreds of thousands of people. Some people argue that President Biden should continue this policy, but others point out the flaws in using taxpayer money to forgive such large amounts of debt. Mike Rowe, host of the TV show Dirty Jobs makes that argument during an interview with John Stossel, asking that if the government forgives student loan debt, why wouldn’t they also be expected to forgive the debt of purchasing a work truck? Another criticism some people have of student loan forgiveness is that it’s regressive; that is the relief disproportionately goes towards the wealthy while serving little benefit to those in lower-income households, because a large portion of student loan debt is owed by the top 20 percent of earners.
Climate Change
Some of the first things Biden did after being sworn into office were reversing steps at deregulation taken by the Trump Administration, reentering the U.S. into the Paris Climate Agreement, and canceling the Keystone XL Pipeline. Those policies, all enacted through executive orders, fulfilled some of his campaign promises and earned him praise from his base.
Not everyone was happy with those decisions, however. Many people claim that deregulation harms the environment, but others (myself included) argue the government causes more problems than it solves when it interferes with the private sector, and that the market will work its way towards cleaner energy on its own if that’s what consumers want. There are also valid criticisms of the Paris Climate Accord and canceling the Keystone XL Pipeline, a brief example of those are the claim that the Paris Agreement is mostly performative, and canceling the pipeline doesn’t prevent oil from entering the United States, but instead requires that oil to be transported via trucks and trains, which is less environmentally friendly.
Immigration Reform
I think it’s fair to say that immigration was a staple of Biden’s campaign. With the constant criticism Democrats rightfully placed on Donald Trump’s harsh immigration policies, Biden made a point to ensure us that he would do better than his predecessor. While some positive developments have taken place, other aspects of our immigration system seem no better than they were one or two years ago.
Biden did loosen some of Trump’s restrictions, specifically the policy of separating families at the border, but the gears of bureaucracy move slow. Many of the children separated from their families are still held in cages, except now the media refers to them as detention centers. As reported by Reason, these centers are still riddled with problems, including inadequate healthcare, undercooked food, and even abuse.
One area where Joe Biden has been an improvement over Donald Trump has been his policies on refugees. Early on Biden controversially stated his intention to keep the refugee cap at the historical low it had been at under Trump, but he quickly walked back those statements after a wave of backlash and raised the cap like he initially said he would. His administration also accepted many refugees from Afghanistan earlier this year, and rightfully so, considering it was our meddling in their country that caused the crisis in the first place.
Improving Relations With U.S. Allies
After four years of Trump’s antics, Biden campaigned on returning us to normalcy not just at home, but on the world stage as well. One could argue that “normalcy” was a problem even before Donald Trump’s presidency, but that’s beside the point. Trump had caused waves by criticizing international organizations like NATO, specifically about the fact that the U.S. was giving more financial support than other member states. Biden entered his term with a promise of mending those relationships, and of “reclaiming our credibility and moral authority.”
Biden appears to have more or less stabilized some of those alliances, and there has definitely been a change in the rhetoric around this issue. However, in the name of helping allies and promoting democracy, the Biden Administration has increased the potential for conflict with our adversaries, specifically China and Russia over Taiwan and Ukraine, respectively. Returning us to normalcy with our allies shouldn’t mean provoking our opponents. Biden has also made little progress on restoring the Iran Nuclear Deal by refusing to lift the sanctions that have been imposed on the country and failing to guarantee the U.S. won’t leave the deal in the future, like what happened under Donald Trump.
Ending Forever Wars
Much like Barack Obama and Donald Trump before him, Joe Biden campaigned on fixing our foreign policy and getting us out of “Forever Wars” in the Middle East. While that had been a talking point for years, progress was finally made on that issue last year when Biden followed through on the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan. To be fair, the deal was made during Trump’s presidency but took place after Biden took office. While the withdrawal was a shitshow by all accounts, the blame for that debacle can’t be placed solely on Joe Biden, although he did authorize the drone strike that killed ten innocent civilians, including seven children.
Could he have done things differently to alleviate some of the negative aspects? Probably, but that doesn’t mean he’s to blame for the entire situation. The possibility that the government we had created in that country would implode as soon as we left was the reason it took 20 years and multiple administrations to withdraw in the first place. Many government officials involved in the project knew it was destined to fail, and no one wanted to be part of the administration that finally pulled out our troops just to see two decades of effort collapse in on itself, but eventually, it had to be done. Even though the withdrawal was botched, it was a decision that was long overdue.
Biden pulling our troops out of Afghanistan doesn’t mean he has put an end to all of the Forever Wars, however. Our troops might not be on the ground in Afghanistan, but the U.S. will still use “over the horizon capabilities” to conduct drone strikes in the country. We are also still providing aid to the Saudi-led war on Yemen — which has caused a humanitarian crisis in that country — despite Biden promising to end the support earlier in his presidency. The U.S. is also currently engaged militarily in countries such as Iraq, Syria, and Somalia to name a few, and has military bases all over the world. Clearly, the “Forever Wars” have not ended yet.
Unity
Last but not least, Biden campaigned on fixing the divisive nature of current U.S. politics. Donald Trump was an extremely polarizing figure, which exacerbated a trend of tribalism that has been taking place in this country. Despite Biden’s claim to provide unity, his first year has been full of blaming the Republicans as well as those who have chosen to forgo the Covid-19 vaccine for the problems we continue to face. He has also continually tried to use his party’s razor-thin majority in Congress to try to pass his progressive agenda. While the infrastructure bill that passed this year was bipartisan, it was originally linked to his Build Back Better plan, which was filled with Democratic priorities. In my opinion, there has been very little unity since Biden took office.
Conclusion
Biden’s first year as our 46th President has ended with a mixed bag of accomplishments and failures. Personally, I think we should take this as a reminder that the President, any president, is not the cause of all the problems we face individually or as a country, nor is he someone who can provide solutions to those problems. The President, like the rest of us, is a human being and should be seen as such. We should all hold our leaders accountable for their actions, and we should pay attention to what they say and do, but we shouldn’t put them on a higher pedestal than they deserve. We would do well to remember that we are in control of our own lives, regardless of who’s in the White House.
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