4 things to watch as President Biden begins midpoint of his term
President Joe Biden walks to Air Force One at Munich Airport in southern Germany on June 28 after attending the G7 Summit. Credit: AFP via Getty Images/BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI
WASHINGTON — With the midterms behind him, a divided Congress before him and the prospect of a presidential campaign drawing closer, President Joe Biden is entering the new year, and the midpoint of his first term, with a swirl of questions surrounding his political future.
For the past two years, boosted by Democratic control of both chambers of Congress, Biden passed key pieces of his legislative agenda, including an infrastructure package focused on upgrading the nation’s crumbling transportation systems, increased funding for clean energy initiatives, gun-safety legislation, and a push to increase domestic production of computer chips and new technologies.
Several of Biden’s legislative pushes — including the $1.2 trillion infrastructure package — were passed with bipartisan support, but several GOP leaders, including Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who early Saturday became House speaker, have vowed to block Biden’s agenda in the new congressional session in which House Republicans have a narrow edge over Democrats.
Meena Bose, director of Hofstra University’s Kalikow Center for the Study of the American Presidency, said the past year “has been a good year for President Biden,” but noted that the third and fourth year of a president’s first term are typically challenging as the next presidential election cycle starts to take shape and both parties become more entrenched in their positions.
“There's a lot that Biden can point to in first two years in office,” Bose said, referring to the passage of major legislation with some bipartisan support. “That will be a challenge in the next two years. I would say that if President Biden decides not to run … that will be seen as a real kind of endpoint to the presidency. Maybe that will bring a kind of open-ended campaign in both parties that will perhaps bring more attention to elections and less to governance.”
Here are four things to watch for in Biden’s next year in office.
Biden in November said his “intention is to run again,” but the 80-year-old president, the oldest to be sworn into office, has yet to officially activate his campaign operation.
A formal declaration of candidacy would require Biden to file paperwork with the Federal Election Commission, something he has yet to do.
Biden’s challenger in the 2020 race, former Republican President Donald Trump, announced his candidacy shortly after the midterm elections, and several other Republicans, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are reportedly weighing a run for the GOP nomination.
Democratic campaign strategist Hank Sheinkopf said that if Biden decides to seek reelection, he should make it official by February or March because of the sheer amount of time it takes to assemble a campaign operation.
Waiting too long to enter the race could delay other Democrats waiting in the wings from mobilizing their campaign fundraising efforts. Vice President Kamala Harris, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and California Gov. Gavin Newsom are among the names often floated as possible contenders should Biden not seek reelection.
“The new generation of Democrats may not be able to beat DeSantis … they have limited standing,” Sheinkopf said. “They're really not well known nationally. DeSantis is likely to be very difficult to get past if he's the nominee. And Joe Biden is well positioned to do that.”
The White House has been preparing for months for a barrage of House Republican-led investigations into Biden as the GOP assumes control of the chamber.
House Republican leaders, including Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the incoming House Oversight Committee chairman, have vowed to launch investigations into Biden’s son, Hunter, and his business dealings. Republicans have accused the Biden scion of profiting off his father’s position, but the president repeatedly has said he has played no role in his son’s foreign business dealings.
Comer, at a post-election news briefing in November, said investigating Hunter Biden and other Biden family members will be a top priority to determine if their private business dealings “compromise U.S. national security and President Biden’s ability to lead with impartiality.”
House GOP leaders also have promised investigations into the Biden administration’s handling of the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, immigration enforcement at the U.S. southern border, and the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The White House in May hired veteran white-collar defense attorney Richard Sauber to respond to the expected wave of subpoenas and information requests, and also brought on Ian Sams, a former campaign spokesman for Harris, to serve as a spokesman for “oversight and investigation” issues.
“Instead of focusing on the important issues the American people want leaders in Washington to work together on, they’re doubling down on politically-motivated, conspiracy-laden personal attacks as their top priority,” Sams tweeted on Dec. 18, linking to a recent USA Today/Suffolk University poll that showed investigations into Biden and his family ranked low among the top issues voters polled believe Congress should prioritize in the coming year. The economy, immigration and climate change topped the list.
White House officials continue to insist they believe there is still the opportunity to negotiate and work with the incoming House GOP majority, noting that most of the incoming freshman Republicans are moderates, some hailing from districts previously won by Biden.
White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates in a statement said Biden “goes into the new year with his hand outstretched to both parties in Congress, ready to keep putting country ahead of party and staying steadfastly focused on the needs of American families above all else.”
McCarthy has scoffed at those suggestions, telling reporters a “new direction is coming,” and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has pledged to “partner closely with and serve alongside the new Republican House.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) in a December floor speech noted that Democrats and Republicans were able to come together over the past two years to pass sweeping pieces of legislation and said in the 118th session of Congress that the two sides “need to find ways to work together.”
"We very much want to work with that group that understands that we've got to get things done in a bipartisan way, and just railing and shrieking and decrying — with no solutions and pure anger — ain't the way to go,” Schumer said. “It's not the way the American people want us to go.”
The conservative-leaning U.S. Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments in separate lawsuits that look to invalidate Biden’s student loan forgiveness program and aim to stop the administration from winding down the Trump-era Title 42 policy that has allowed the federal government to expel migrants over COVID-19 concerns.
The court, stacked with three Trump appointees, has sided against other Biden policy initiatives. In January 2022, the court’s six conservatives struck down Biden’s vaccine-or-test mandate for large private businesses. In November, they blocked Biden from implementing a policy that sought to pause blanket deportations of immigrants living in the country illegally to focus instead on deporting those that had committed “egregious threats to public safety.”
The court will hear oral arguments in the student loan forgiveness case and the Title 42 case in February and is expected to issue rulings in June, according to the court’s calendar.
WASHINGTON — With the midterms behind him, a divided Congress before him and the prospect of a presidential campaign drawing closer, President Joe Biden is entering the new year, and the midpoint of his first term, with a swirl of questions surrounding his political future.
For the past two years, boosted by Democratic control of both chambers of Congress, Biden passed key pieces of his legislative agenda, including an infrastructure package focused on upgrading the nation’s crumbling transportation systems, increased funding for clean energy initiatives, gun-safety legislation, and a push to increase domestic production of computer chips and new technologies.
Several of Biden’s legislative pushes — including the $1.2 trillion infrastructure package — were passed with bipartisan support, but several GOP leaders, including Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who early Saturday became House speaker, have vowed to block Biden’s agenda in the new congressional session in which House Republicans have a narrow edge over Democrats.
Meena Bose, director of Hofstra University’s Kalikow Center for the Study of the American Presidency, said the past year “has been a good year for President Biden,” but noted that the third and fourth year of a president’s first term are typically challenging as the next presidential election cycle starts to take shape and both parties become more entrenched in their positions.
“There's a lot that Biden can point to in first two years in office,” Bose said, referring to the passage of major legislation with some bipartisan support. “That will be a challenge in the next two years. I would say that if President Biden decides not to run … that will be seen as a real kind of endpoint to the presidency. Maybe that will bring a kind of open-ended campaign in both parties that will perhaps bring more attention to elections and less to governance.”
Here are four things to watch for in Biden’s next year in office.
Deciding on 2024
Biden in November said his “intention is to run again,” but the 80-year-old president, the oldest to be sworn into office, has yet to officially activate his campaign operation.
A formal declaration of candidacy would require Biden to file paperwork with the Federal Election Commission, something he has yet to do.
Biden’s challenger in the 2020 race, former Republican President Donald Trump, announced his candidacy shortly after the midterm elections, and several other Republicans, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are reportedly weighing a run for the GOP nomination.
Democratic campaign strategist Hank Sheinkopf said that if Biden decides to seek reelection, he should make it official by February or March because of the sheer amount of time it takes to assemble a campaign operation.
Waiting too long to enter the race could delay other Democrats waiting in the wings from mobilizing their campaign fundraising efforts. Vice President Kamala Harris, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and California Gov. Gavin Newsom are among the names often floated as possible contenders should Biden not seek reelection.
“The new generation of Democrats may not be able to beat DeSantis … they have limited standing,” Sheinkopf said. “They're really not well known nationally. DeSantis is likely to be very difficult to get past if he's the nominee. And Joe Biden is well positioned to do that.”
Wave of investigations
The White House has been preparing for months for a barrage of House Republican-led investigations into Biden as the GOP assumes control of the chamber.
House Republican leaders, including Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the incoming House Oversight Committee chairman, have vowed to launch investigations into Biden’s son, Hunter, and his business dealings. Republicans have accused the Biden scion of profiting off his father’s position, but the president repeatedly has said he has played no role in his son’s foreign business dealings.
Comer, at a post-election news briefing in November, said investigating Hunter Biden and other Biden family members will be a top priority to determine if their private business dealings “compromise U.S. national security and President Biden’s ability to lead with impartiality.”
House GOP leaders also have promised investigations into the Biden administration’s handling of the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, immigration enforcement at the U.S. southern border, and the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The White House in May hired veteran white-collar defense attorney Richard Sauber to respond to the expected wave of subpoenas and information requests, and also brought on Ian Sams, a former campaign spokesman for Harris, to serve as a spokesman for “oversight and investigation” issues.
“Instead of focusing on the important issues the American people want leaders in Washington to work together on, they’re doubling down on politically-motivated, conspiracy-laden personal attacks as their top priority,” Sams tweeted on Dec. 18, linking to a recent USA Today/Suffolk University poll that showed investigations into Biden and his family ranked low among the top issues voters polled believe Congress should prioritize in the coming year. The economy, immigration and climate change topped the list.
Navigating a divided Congress
White House officials continue to insist they believe there is still the opportunity to negotiate and work with the incoming House GOP majority, noting that most of the incoming freshman Republicans are moderates, some hailing from districts previously won by Biden.
White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates in a statement said Biden “goes into the new year with his hand outstretched to both parties in Congress, ready to keep putting country ahead of party and staying steadfastly focused on the needs of American families above all else.”
McCarthy has scoffed at those suggestions, telling reporters a “new direction is coming,” and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has pledged to “partner closely with and serve alongside the new Republican House.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) in a December floor speech noted that Democrats and Republicans were able to come together over the past two years to pass sweeping pieces of legislation and said in the 118th session of Congress that the two sides “need to find ways to work together.”
"We very much want to work with that group that understands that we've got to get things done in a bipartisan way, and just railing and shrieking and decrying — with no solutions and pure anger — ain't the way to go,” Schumer said. “It's not the way the American people want us to go.”
Supreme Court decisions
The conservative-leaning U.S. Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments in separate lawsuits that look to invalidate Biden’s student loan forgiveness program and aim to stop the administration from winding down the Trump-era Title 42 policy that has allowed the federal government to expel migrants over COVID-19 concerns.
The court, stacked with three Trump appointees, has sided against other Biden policy initiatives. In January 2022, the court’s six conservatives struck down Biden’s vaccine-or-test mandate for large private businesses. In November, they blocked Biden from implementing a policy that sought to pause blanket deportations of immigrants living in the country illegally to focus instead on deporting those that had committed “egregious threats to public safety.”
The court will hear oral arguments in the student loan forgiveness case and the Title 42 case in February and is expected to issue rulings in June, according to the court’s calendar.
Laura Figueroa Hernandez is the White House correspondent and previously covered New York City politics and government. She joined Newsday in 2012 after covering state and local politics for The Miami Herald.
Protests resume at Stony Brook ... Hempstead sues MTA over congestion pricing ... SCPD graduation ... Sci-Fi renaissance
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