Democratic strategist Max Burns wants to know why “voting rights” activists humiliated President Joe Biden by boycotting his Georgia speech. But those activists recognize just how weak and inconsequential the president is. The only person embarrassing Biden is himself.
Writing for NBC News, Burns calls the “Republican Party’s war on voting rights” the “single most important policy challenge” Democrats face. After all, if you can’t have 24-hour drive-thru voting in Texas and Georgia, democracy is basically dead. Or something. But Burns decries that activists and their voting rights organizations chose to boycott Biden’s speech.
“Biden does deserve criticism for his slow walk to this moment, but all the evidence points to a Democratic Party that is finally ready to make its stand for voting rights,” Burns writes. “That means it’s inexplicable to try to humiliate Biden at the moment he’s finally embracing the action we need — and deflate the unifying energy this historic accomplishment should provide a fraying party.”
But maybe those activists recognize Biden for the fraud that he is. Burns cites Biden’s speech as proof that Biden is ready “to fight more aggressively” against GOP voting laws — but Biden’s speech came from a position of weakness, not one of power. Democrats still do not have the votes for their proposed voting bills because they do not have the votes to eliminate or alter the filibuster.
It’s no coincidence Biden’s speech was scheduled for Tuesday, the day after the Georgia Bulldogs would play Alabama in the college football National Championship game. Biden’s speech would be buried by the aftermath of the game even if Georgia lost. The Bulldogs won, and Biden’s speech was an afterthought.
To give you an idea of where Biden’s visit ranks in Atlanta news right now in the aftermath of the Georgia championship, here’s the @ajc “most read” list … #gapol pic.twitter.com/EPsrU78BfR
— Greg Bluestein (@bluestein) January 11, 2022
The reason Biden has taken up this issue is because of his other failures. The crashing and burning of the Build Back Better bill had to be put in the rearview mirror. Last year, inflation rose at the fastest pace since 1982. Democrats have already pivoted to the 2022 campaign, trying to scare their base into turning out to vote to overcome the phantom of voter suppression.
Despite having the majority in the House of Representatives and controlling the Senate, Biden is already a lame-duck president. Democrats have nothing left on their agenda and are headed toward a train wreck in the midterm election this November. Biden is old, unpopular, and failing at almost every turn. Voting rights activists recognized Biden’s speech as the performative stunt that it was. They aren’t embarrassing him — Biden does that well enough himself.
