Biden’s Legacy: Far-Reaching Accomplishments That Didn’t Translate into Political Support

US President Joe Biden waves while boarding Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on November 1, 2022. (AFP)
US President Joe Biden waves while boarding Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on November 1, 2022. (AFP)
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Biden’s Legacy: Far-Reaching Accomplishments That Didn’t Translate into Political Support

US President Joe Biden waves while boarding Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on November 1, 2022. (AFP)
US President Joe Biden waves while boarding Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on November 1, 2022. (AFP)

Sitting in the Oval Office behind the iconic Resolute desk in 2022, an animated President Joe Biden described the challenge of leading a psychologically traumatized nation.

The United States had endured a life-altering pandemic. There was a jarring burst of inflation and now global conflict with Russia invading Ukraine, as well as the persistent threat to democracy he felt Donald Trump posed.

How could Biden possibly heal that collective trauma?

“Be confident,” he said emphatically in an interview with The Associated Press. “Be confident. Because I am confident.”

But in the ensuing two years, the confidence Biden hoped to instill steadily waned. And when the 81-year-old Democratic president showed his age in a disastrous debate in June against Trump, he lost the benefit of the doubt as well. That triggered a series of events that led him Sunday to step down as his party's nominee for the November's election.

Democrats, who had been united in their resolve to prevent another Trump term, suddenly fractured. And Republicans, beset by chaos in Congress and the former president’s criminal conviction, improbably coalesced in defiant unity.

Biden never figured out how to inspire the world’s most powerful country to believe in itself, let alone in him.

He lost the confidence of supporters in the 90-minute debate with Trump, even if pride initially prompted him to override the fears of lawmakers, party elders and donors who were nudging him to drop out. Then Trump survived an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania and, as if on cue, pumped his fist in strength. Biden, while campaigning in Las Vegas, tested positive for the coronavirus Wednesday and retreated to his Delaware beach home to recover.

The events over the course of three weeks led to an exit Biden never wanted, but one that Democrats felt they needed to maximize their chance of winning in November’s elections.

Biden seems to have badly misread the breadth of his support. While many Democrats had deep admiration for the president personally, they did not have the same affection for him politically.

Rice University historian Douglas Brinkley said Biden arrived as a reprieve from a nation exhausted by Trump and the pandemic, reported The Associated Press.

“He was a perfect person for that moment,” said Brinkley, noting Biden proved in era of polarization that bipartisan lawmaking was still possible.

Yet, there was never a “Joe Biden Democrat” like there was a “Reagan Republican.” He did not have adoring, movement-style followers as did Barack Obama or John F. Kennedy. He was not a generational candidate like Bill Clinton. The only barrier-breaking dimension to his election was the fact that he was the oldest person ever elected president.

His first run for the White House, in the 1988 cycle, ended with self-inflicted wounds stemming from plagiarism, and he didn’t make it to the first nominating contest. In 2008, he dropped out after the Iowa caucuses, where he won less than 1% of the vote.

In 2016, Obama counseled his vice president not to run. A Biden victory in 2020 seemed implausible, when he finished fourth in Iowa and fifth in New Hampshire before a dramatic rebound in South Carolina that propelled him to the nomination and the White House.

David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to Obama who also worked closely with Biden, said that history would treat Biden kinder than voters had, not just because of his legislative achievements but because in 2020 he defeated Trump.

“His legacy is significant beyond all his many accomplishments,” Axelrod said. “He will always be the man who stepped up and defeated a president who placed himself above our democracy."

But Biden could not avoid his age. And when he showed frailty in his steps and his speech, there was no foundation of supporters that could stand by him to stop calls for him to step aside.

It was a humbling end to a half-century career in politics, yet hardly reflective of the full legacy of his time in the White House.

In March of 2021, Biden launched $1.9 trillion in pandemic aid, creating a series of new programs that temporarily halved child poverty, halted evictions and contributed to the addition of 15.7 million jobs. But inflation began to rise shortly thereafter as Biden’s approval rating as measured by the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research fell from 61% to 39% as of June.

He followed up with a series of executive actions to unsnarl global supply chains and a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package that not only replaced aging infrastructure but improved internet access and prepared communities to withstand the damages from climate change.

In 2022, Biden and his fellow Democrats followed up with two measures that reinvigorated the future of US manufacturing.

The CHIPS and Science Act provided $52 billion to build factories and create institutions to make computer chips domestically, ensuring that the US would have access to the most advanced semiconductors needed to power economic growth and maintain national security. There was also the Inflation Reduction Act, which provided incentives to shift away from fossil fuels and enabled Medicare to negotiate drug prices.

Biden also sought to compete more aggressively with China, rebuild alliances such as NATO and completed the US withdrawal from Afghanistan that resulted in the death of 13 US service members.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022 worsened inflation as Trump and other Republicans questioned the value of military aid to the Ukrainians.

Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack in Israel sparked a war that showed divisions within the Democratic party about whether the United States should continue to support Israel as tens of thousands of Palestinians died in months of counterattacks. The president was also criticized over illegal border crossings at the southern border with Mexico.

Yet it was the size of the stakes and the fear of a Biden loss that prevailed, resulting in a bet by Democrats that the tasks he began could best be completed by a younger generation.

“History will be kinder to him than voters were at the end,” Axelrod said.



Experts to Asharq Al-Awsat: Trump Confronts Houthis with New Reality, Strikes Not Enough to Defeat them 

A plume of smoke billows during a US strike on Yemen's Houthi-held capital Sanaa early on March 16, 2025. (AFP)
A plume of smoke billows during a US strike on Yemen's Houthi-held capital Sanaa early on March 16, 2025. (AFP)
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Experts to Asharq Al-Awsat: Trump Confronts Houthis with New Reality, Strikes Not Enough to Defeat them 

A plume of smoke billows during a US strike on Yemen's Houthi-held capital Sanaa early on March 16, 2025. (AFP)
A plume of smoke billows during a US strike on Yemen's Houthi-held capital Sanaa early on March 16, 2025. (AFP)

Experts said US President Donald Trump has confronted the Iran-backed Houthi militias in Yemen with a new reality in wake of the airstrikes Washington has launched against them over the weekend.

Trump launched the strikes on Saturday to deter the Houthis from attacking military and commercial vessels in the Red Sea.

The Houthi-run Health Ministry said the overnight US strikes killed at least 53 people, including five women and two children, and wounded almost 100 in the capital of Sanaa and other provinces, including the northern province of Saada, the Houthi stronghold.

The White House announced on Sunday the killing of major Houthi leaderships in the attacks. The Houthis have yet to comment.

The Houthis have repeatedly targeted international shipping in the Red Sea, sinking two vessels, in what they call acts of solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza, where Israel has been at war with Hamas, another Iranian ally.

The attacks stopped when a Israel-Hamas ceasefire took hold in January — a day before Trump took office — but last week the Houthis said they would renew attacks against Israeli vessels after Israel cut off the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza this month.

There have been no Houthi attacks reported since then.

The Houthis on Sunday claimed to have targeted the USS Harry S. Truman carrier strike group with missiles and a drone.

Washington and the Houthis have vowed escalation.

In the first official remarks by the government since the US strikes, deputy Foreign Minister Mustafa Numan said the militias believed their own delusions that they could confront the entire world.

“Instead, they have brought catastrophe to our country and innocent people,” he lamented to Asharq Al-Awsat, adding that the Houthis cannot wage this “reckless” war.

He recalled the concessions his government had made to end the war and move forward towards peace. The Houthis, however, dismissed all of these efforts, “stalled and rejected Saudi attempts to end the war.”

“The Houthis have crossed all red lines and brazenly defied the international community by promoting attractive slogans that are in effect useless,” Numan said.

Senior Fellow at the Washington Center for Yemeni Studies Sadeq Al-Wesabi criticized the Biden administration for lacking the will to understand the nature of the Houthis and how they operate.

“Trump has now come along to address the Houthis the only way they know well: force,” he told Asharq Al-Awsat.

President of surprises

Trump took the world by surprise when the announced the launch of the attacks on Saturday.

Trump, in a post on social media, promised to “use overwhelming lethal force” and ordered Iran to “immediately” cut its support.

“Your time is up, and your attacks must stop, starting today. If they don’t, hell will rain down upon you like nothing you have ever seen before,” he said in a statement on Truth Social, his social media site.

“I have ordered the US military today to launch a decisive and powerful military operation against the Houthi terrorists in Yemen,” he said, adding that Washington “will use overwhelming lethal force until we have achieved our objective”.

Co-founder of the Sanaa Center for Strategic Studies Maged al-Madhaji said the strikes will push the Houthis towards two options, either seek calm and make a weak gesture after the attacks, or resort to major escalation in the Red Sea.

In remarks to Asharq Al-Awsat, he said the US strikes marked a major shift in position towards Yemen. He noted that the strikes were preceded by Washington re-designating the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, in a sign that it wanted to inflict damage on the militias, not just contain them.

Motives and messages

The balances of power in the region have been upended since Hamas launched its deadly attack against Israel on October 7, 2023. Iran’s proxies in the region, namely Hezbollah and Hamas, have been severely weakened by Israel and Iran itself was targeted twice by Israeli attacks.

Tehran is being confronted with Trump who is again applying his “maximum pressure campaign.” It is now in an unprecedented and weaker position should it return to negotiations over its nuclear program.

President of Girton College at the University of Cambridge Dr. Elisabeth Kendall said the US strikes are driven by three factors: protecting international shipping, preempting any Houthi attack and intensifying the pressure on Iran.

The Biden administration had frequently said that it wanted to target Houthi capabilities, not its members. But Trump is making it clear that he is targeting both, in a direct message to Iran.

Kendall told Asharq Al-Awsat that the strikes may be a precursor to a direct attack on Iran.

With Hamas and Hezbollah weakened and the ouster of Iran-ally Bashar al-Assad from Syria, the Houthis are Tehran’s only remaining powerful group.

A weakening of the Houthis’ military capabilities will limit Iran’s retaliation options should the US and Israel carry out direct strikes against it to prevent it from pursuing its nuclear ambitions, Kendall explained.

Al-Madhaji noted that the Houthis have limited options in which to respond. They can no longer rely on Hezbollah for backup. The Houthis are effectively the last remaining Iranian proxy that can spark any escalation in the region.

Former Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Mark Kimmitt predicted that the Houthis will retaliate to the strikes by targeting more ships in the Red Sea.

The conflict in Yemen will not end until the Houthis realize that their war has not achieved its goals and that they have run out of ammunition, he told Asharq Al-Awsat.

Houthi narrative

It has taken the US and western powers ten years to realize that the Houthis do not want peace, said a Yemeni source who chose to remain anonymous.

In 2018, Asharq Al-Awsat reported on how the Saudi-led Coalition to Support Legitimacy in Yemen had waged an unprecedented battle in the southern Red Sea to protect global shipping from the Houthis.

The militias responded by sending messages to the world that they do not harbor hostile intentions, all the while the Coalition was neutralizing booby-trapped Houthi vessels and escorting vessels in the vital waterway.

The coalition had repeatedly warned that the Houthis must not be allowed to acquire sophisticated weapons from Iran. The world ignored the warnings and is now grappling with the Houthi threat to international marine navigation.

The West had long believed the Houthis were a local Yemeni problem and that their influence will remain confined to the country. It believed that the militias were not closely tied to Iran and that they actually wanted to take part in resolving the Yemeni conflict through political means.

This was the narrative that the Houthis and Iran and its “Resistance Axis” sought to promote to the world, said a senior Yemeni official on condition of anonymity. This narrative was dashed as the Houthis escalated their attacks in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden and threatened international trade and western interests.

Will strikes succeed?

The question remains: Will the US strikes have any impact on the Houthis who have withstood western strikes before?

In a post on the X platform, Hannah Porter, a senior research officer at ARK Group, said: “I don't know how many times this needs to be repeated, but if airstrikes were enough to stop the Houthis, the group would have been defeated many, many times over the past decade.”

She told Asharq Al-Awsat that there was a very real chance that the Houthis – who thrive in times of war – may not be defeated by military force.

The Trump administration is hoping that its attacks and terrorist designation will lead to the defeat of the Houthis, but the militias have demonstrated over the years their ability to withstand a lot of pressure, she added.

She expected that the Houthis will almost certainly respond to the strikes with escalation, either by attacking ships or American interests or the interests of its allies.

Al-Wesabi stressed that the current US strikes are more intense and accurate than the limited ones launched by the Biden administration.

Their success, however, hinges on whether they take out the top Houthi leaders which would be a blow to the militants’ morale and pave the way for the legitimate government forces, which are on alert, to act.

Failure to take out these leaders will only prolong the conflict, he warned.