Biden opens door to right

Donald Trump speaking to supporters in Arizona, US (Picture: Gage Skidmore)

‘The Democrats want to turn America into communist Cuba or socialist Venezuela,” said Donald Trump, warning Republicans at a rally for this week’s mid-term elections. “You have to crush the communists at the ballot box.” 

He finished appearances with music linked to the QAnon “storm” that will destroy the “globalists”—far right code for Jews. And a vast number of Republican candidates peddle Trump’s lie that Joe Biden stole the presidency through voting fraud. No wonder there was a wave of death threats against election workers.

The Republicans hope to make big electoral gains this week. They will use any advance to renew the assaults on migrants, bolster police powers, strip away abortion rights and make working class people pay for the economic crisis.  

But the Republicans could only have such hopes because of the failures of Biden and the Democrats. The money Biden promised for infrastructure projects was slashed in half, many environmental projects were scrapped and nothing effective was done to defend abortion rights. Instead, tens of billions of dollars have gone to the war in Ukraine and to build up the military.

If the Democrats lose this week it will be because they have failed ordinary people. The real hope in the US is the rising tide of strikes that shows workers won’t be limited to choosing between two capitalist parties.