Why another era of mainstream liberalism could be fatal

In the words of Amanda Gorman, the youngest poet laureate to read at a presidential inauguration, America is "not broken but simply unfinished". While we await this new administration of many firsts to finish putting America back together, turn the country around, bring the world back to normalcy with America's axiomatic leadership, bring back respect in politics, join accords and sign treaties, we also have to ask ourselves if we want to go back to the "good old days" of liberalism. President Joe Biden's ideology is the normal, old-school liberalism that created the conditions for demagogues like Donald Trump. Liberals invited Trump to their weddings, showered him with tax breaks, and for years refused to prosecute his tax fraud and other improprieties. This is the same liberalism that realised American greatness in the Trump hotels and towers that form the city skylines.

Trump is the physical manifestation of the struggle that lies within the crux of the American body politic. As he left office on January 20, he also left many progenies of new Trumps in the making. America's great institutions are not immune to acts of subversion, as many have been filled with Trumpians. The courts may have halted the nonsensical Trumpian mayhem of election fraud claims, but the court system, packed with Trump appointees, will make partisan decisions that would derail many progressive efforts in the years to come. Right before leaving office, the Trump administration filled the apolitical civil service with their political allies.

At the popular level, it may be only a matter of time before a Trump 2.0 rises to prominence. Populist rhetoric has been utilised by the Tea Party, then the Proud Boys, both in denial that America might refuse to vote for their preferred candidate. The result: an attempt to overthrow the United States government on January 6. The harrowing experience will be recorded as a dark day in history for many Americans, but as a day of national pride for many Trump supporters. This day was foreshadowed by the magnitude of polarisation that has become increasingly contentious and visible.

The Biden administration must go beyond fulfilling its promises—there must be more than healing and damage control if the United States is to avoid another catastrophe. Global observers of American politics have stakes in the electoral outcomes of the superpower, as it determines the geopolitical fate of the world. We must remember that Biden won by narrow margins in the battleground states, and close to 47 percent of the country voted for Trump. This may very well be the beginning of widespread white extremist mobilisation. The cancer has already spread. The insurgents who rattled the halls of the Capitol were protecting the sanctity of their version of democracy from unscrupulous politicians. In their perspective, people took power in their own hands through grassroots organising for a worthy cause—fighting for the soul of America. They lost faith in their party and the institutions of law and order.

They were heard, empowered and emboldened by their commander-in-chief in the White House. Trump's Twitter may have been shut down but the crowds willing to commit violence and put their lives on the line are revealing their insurmountable conviction. The movement is beyond one Twitter account. While right-leaning Fox News, the most watched news network in America, villainises Black Lives Matter protesters as radical anti-fascists and humanises the insurgents, it is very important for us to stop dismissing and start understanding how fascist predispositions are standardised throughout the world. At any cost we cannot repeat the Trumpian dystopia of the past four years as the same brand of politics of fearmongering and pathology can be exported to the rest of the world and have devastating consequences. We have witnessed spikes in right-wing hate crimes, human rights violations and strengthening of nationalist parties across the globe, from Brazil to Germany to the Philippines. Covid-19 deaths are also shared disproportionally by countries with right-wing nationalist governments, a common symptom signifying the pitfalls of demagoguery. 

When Donald Trump ran for office, his base was riled up against many things that is wrong with America—the forgotten White working class in Appalachia, joblessness and deaths in rural America and inner cities, failing trade deals, unmet promises of Washington insiders. Trump was perceived as a viable alternative, and still is for many Americans, even if that means putting some communities under the bus. The disparate treatment of the insurgents at the Capitol speaks volumes about the ingrained racism in institutions of power. The real damage lies in the division where there is no scope for polarised and segregated echelons of the society to connect. America is many countries in one, from the liberal college campuses of the northeast to the Rust and Bible Belts in the mid-west and the south of the country, each America with a different way of life. 

The liberalism of giving less to the little man produces sustained frustration in the public. Racism alone cannot explain the Trump phenomena. The deep schisms in the social fabric are visible in the widening rural-urban divide, wealth and income inequality, the impeded mobility of the working class, piling up bills from hospitals, crushing student loan debt, and the declining industrial cities of the Rust Belt. The Biden administration's temporary moratorium on problems may not be enough. We may harbour some cautious optimism when it comes to domestic policies and economic relief. However, historically, Democrats have not had significant difference with the Republicans on foreign policy. The unanimous and effortless confirmation of Avril Haines, who approved drones to be used against civilians under the Obama administration, as the Director of National Intelligence, could mean that Biden's approach to foreign policy will likely be similar to the militarism of Obama.

President Obama inherited injustices from mass incarceration to the mortgage crisis, but failed to sufficiently address them in a manner beneficial to working-class Americans, whether they be Black, White, Asian-American, Native American, or Latino. Eight years of a historic presidency might not have been enough in undoing the wrong that lies in the root of America's inception, but Obama's hope and change did not go beyond mere rhetoric. The result was rising economic inequality, racial injustices that have proven intransigent, and anger boiling over in the 2016 election. 

Regardless of the great slew of executive orders signed by Biden in his first week in office, what is worrisome is that this administration may be a repetition of the failure of the past Democratic administrations. The consequences of taking the middle path may again materialise into a more serious firebrand who is more charismatic, more diplomatic and able to fill in the void in the Republican party left by Trump; as Trump said in his parting words, he will be back in "some form". What will happen in 2024 is in the hands of Democrats. They have the House, the Senate, and the presidency. Constitutionally, they are able to pass the legislation they want, from Medicare for All to free college to a Green New Deal. If they fail to do so and refuse to protect working-class Americans from the depravities of contemporary capitalism, they will reap what they sow in the next election cycle.

The greatest hope for democracy and the cause of justice is the stronger presence of the political left in politics today than there was in 2016. Biden's victory would not have been possible without the grassroots efforts of the left that went above and beyond simply organising for Biden, an old-school establishment candidate who initially did not present anything exciting on the stage like Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren. With rising socialist politicians like Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, working-class Americans have leaders they can trust in Washington for the first time in decades. They rallied support for Biden, who became one last desperate attempt to gasp for breath for a nation struggling to rise from the dead. Many people voted for this administration with the hope of survival. But we need to go beyond surviving if we want to stop another Trump from happening. We need to thrive.

Sarzah Yeasmin is a Boston-based Bangladeshi writer and graduate student studying education policy at Harvard University. She is the coordinator for the university's innovations in government programme.