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Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee President Biden. There are great lamentations in the halls of the White House today as the grand statements made the president and vice president before election day return to haunt the administration. Biden and Harris confidently stated that the Virginia gubernatorial election would be an easy victory which would prophecy the results of 2022 and 2024. That hubris has been handsomely rewarded.
White House spoke too soon
The Oracle of Delphi once told King Croesus of Lydia that a great empire would be destroyed if he went to war with Persia. The king did not realize that the oracle was referring to his own empire.
Kamala Harris and Joe Biden dabbled in secular prophecy in the weeks before the November 2 election, suggesting that the results would define what happens in 2022 and 2024.
Like the oracular sayings, there was nothing untrue in this prediction. What happened in Virginia and New Jersey will absolutely define what happens to the White House in the future.
It just so happens that this has turned out to be entirely to the benefit of Republicans, who won a massive upset victory in Virginia and came within inches of pulling off another colossal upset in New Jersey.
If what happened on Tuesday is to predict the results of 2022 and 2024 then the White House can expect to take a beating in heavily blue states which it assumed it would not even need to worry about.
The blow to morale in the White House is not the only damage done; Democrats will now be forced to agonize over future races in states which they had assumed would be safe victories.
Bad sign for 2022 and 2024
The party will either have to spread its resources thin to bolster support in similar blue states or it will risk repeats of Virginia and New Jersey in those states.
Smart Republicans are now aware that these states are not nearly as securely Democratic as both parties had believed them to be and that Glenn Youngkin has found a winning strategy for winning victories there.
Biden and Harris both already have mediocre approval ratings, a fact which presents two looming crises for the Democrats. Firstly, the results Tuesday show that Biden’s low approval ratings do indeed translate into electoral defeats for his party.
Secondly, if the party had any intention of having Kamala Harris take the president’s place in 2024 those hopes must now be disappearing. Harris campaigned extensively in Virginia and seems to have done much more harm than good for her candidate.
More than simply giving up a key gubernatorial race, the White House has allowed Republicans to reclaim the momentum they needed after 2020.
Most presidents see their party take losses in midterm elections. Few presidents see their own words amplify the significance of such a humiliating defeat so early in the four year term.
