Why Europe Needs a Biden Win
There is no saying who will win the US presidential election on Tuesday. Most polls give Biden ahead in enough battleground states to win the presidency, but we know from 2016 that the Trump campaign can be an effective propaganda machinery operating under the radar of conventional polling methods.
There is little doubt however that Europe needs a Biden win, if it is to pull through the prolonged period of turmoil spurred by the pandemic and its devastating health and economic effects. The second round of lockdowns and restrictions implemented by European governments is not meeting the same level of consensus of the spring. Right-wing populist parties and big business actors are riding on people’s fatigue and deepening economic crisis to spread disinformation and fake news to dismiss the real health threat posed by Covid-19.
Right-wing populist parties who are not in power can manipulate the chaos and suffering provoked by the virus to destabilise current governments. For big business, the goal is to keep people’s spending power and consumption high, regardless of the human costs. Powerful economic interests are also scared that the role of the state in the economy might increase, which would take power and wealth away from the hands of the few in order to protect the health and economic security of the many.
Proposals for loosening restrictions and for letting the virus run its course, often advocated under the label of “herd immunity”, are gaining ground again, despite lack of scientific evidence to support them, and warnings that millions of Europeans could die, especially among the elderly, those with pre-existing conditions, essential workers, people of colour and immigrants.
Trump is a powerful ally on the world stage of these nefarious and destructive interests. Even after catching the virus and ending up in hospital, he was able to sell his recovery as the “proof” that Covid-19 is not a big deal, and with the promise that all Americans will be “cured” the way he was –the wild implication here is that ordinary Americans would get the same level of hospital resources and experimental drugs used to save the life of a US president.
Throughout the campaign, Trump has held mass rallies in areas where Covid-19 infections are rising, with barely any social distancing, and few masks visible in the audience. The president says that he will keep the US economy open at all costs. His messages downplay the severity of the pandemic and contain several innuendos to herd immunity.
But what the record shows is that Trump has not only been unable to protect the health of Americans — nearly 240,000 people died of Covid-19 in the US so far. He has also failed to protect working people from economic crisis. When it comes to concrete policy proposals, Trump’s campaign speeches are incoherent rants, showing all the hallmarks of incompetence, tinged by racial bigotry, chauvinism and utter disrespect for human lives.
The contrast with Biden could not be starker. The Democratic presidential candidate diligently wears his mask and only meets a small number of people at a time, following social distancing rules. He is focusing his campaign on a message of empathy for all those Americans who lost their loved ones in the pandemic, and for the majority who have been heavily affected by the economic downturn. Biden promises to take the virus seriously and to work towards a safe reopening of the economy that does not pit jobs against lives.
He promises to expand Obamacare so that all can be protected from the worst of the virus and have access to quality healthcare. His plans include substantial investments to create jobs in the green economy, infrastructure projects, caregiving and education, and to reduce racial inequalities in the economy. These investments will be financed from substantial company and income tax increases targeting the wealthy, effectively reversing Trump’s pro-rich policies. Biden has chosen Kamala Harris as vice-presidential candidate, which increases the chances of having the first female US president at some point in the future.
There is little doubt that the Biden-Harris manifesto is one of the most left-leaning we have seen from the US Democratic Party in a long time. The Democratic left has strongly supported Biden. Unlike 2016, a new consensus between the left and the centre of the party has emerged, to fight the possibility of a second Trump term, and to craft effective policies for the working classes and for people of colour, both bearing the brunt of increasing inequalities in a harsh neoliberal environment.
A Trump victory would be bad news for Europe and for the rest of the world. Trump is strongly opposed to a coordinated international response to the pandemic, and sees the race for a vaccine as a free market competition for the “survival of the fittest” — the most powerful bully (him) rushes to secure doses for his own people, while other countries are left to fend for themselves. Resistance against much needed public health measures, and negative messaging downplaying the virus and fuelling social discontent in Europe will only increase, if the opportunists who are riding on these sentiments can count on the support of the most powerful head of state in the Western world.
Trump, like Putin, is set on exploiting Europe’s internal divisions to his own advantage: he has no interest in a strong Europe that could grow in relative autonomy from America’s waning power. And it is only a strong Europe that can deliver a coordinated public health response to avert catastrophe until a vaccine or a cure for Covid-19 is available. Without consensus among European states, it will be difficult to agree on a Recovery Fund that moves away from the toxic tenets of austerity and fiscal discipline, towards a new deal that puts workers and ordinary citizens at the centre of the economy.
A Biden presidency would in all likelihood play a stabilising role in Europe, and could lead the way towards a resurgence of the welfarist principles of post-WWII, at a time when social cohesion and political stability are threatened by a neoliberal economy that favours profits over people.
Vito Laterza is an anthropologist and political analyst based at the University of Agder, Norway. He is the chief editor of the blog Corona Times and writes regularly for international media such as Al Jazeera English, Boston Review and Foreign Affairs. His twitter handle is @vitolaterza09
The article was originally published by the Greek newspaper To Kouti Tis Pandoras here
