Democrats are furious that former President Joe Biden is set to burst back into the public eye with a speech Tuesday.
Biden, who has kept a low profile since exiting office, will discuss protecting Social Security, which President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have eyed for cuts. And some Democratic insiders are not happy about it.
“It takes a special level of chutzpah as the man most responsible for reelecting Donald Trump to decide it’s your voice that is missing in this moment,” a person who worked closely with Biden’s campaign told Politico. “The country would be better served if he rode off into the sunset.”
One of Biden’s former donors told Politico that giving a speech was “fine” because “that’s what you expect a former president to do, but I don’t anticipate crowds of Democrats wanting him as a focal point of the national conversation.”
After Trump’s victory over Kamala Harris in November, many Democratic insiders threw blame at Biden for only exiting the race after a disastrous debate showing in June, leaving Harris fewer than three months to campaign. Biden left office in January with an approval rating of just 36 percent, matching the lowest of his term, according to CNN.
Since Trump was inaugurated, and amid the whirlwind of challenges to political norms that followed, Biden has had almost no public-facing presence.
He has limited himself to appearing at a Model United Nations conference, a St. Patrick’s Day brunch, and a convention of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, where he accepted a lifetime achievement award.
A longtime donor had a brutal response when asked by CNN if they had heard from Biden. All they said was, “No. Thank God.”
“I haven’t heard of one person who has communicated with him,” a Democratic member of Congress, who used to speak regularly with Biden, told CNN.
People close to him told CNN that his post-presidency has so far been a time for “reconnecting, rebuilding, and reflecting.” He has caught up on books and movies, spent time with his family, and even donned a tuxedo for the opening of Denzel Washington’s Othello on Broadway.
But despite the concerns of many Democrats, the 82-year-old isn’t ready to fade out of the political fold just yet. And by addressing one of the most sensitive targets of the Trump administration at a time when the president’s popularity has sunk under his market-roiling tariffs, Biden is taking aim at the heart of the conversation.
Martin O’Malley, Biden’s Social Security commissioner, is set to appear alongside the ex-president and address a group of disability advocates in Chicago on Tuesday. He told CNN that he’s glad Biden is speaking out against Trump.
“One of the stabilizing influences in the history of our republic has been the voices of former presidents,” he said. “President Biden’s administration racked up a lot of important progress for the people of our country. I don’t believe that as a party we did the best job we could have in telling that story. But there’s no time like the present.”
“I think with every passing day, people miss him more and more. He’s for sure a net positive,” O’Malley added.
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