Did we forget how bad things were before Biden was elected? His mental decline tarnished Biden’s time in office. However, a TIME cover of Biden’s first day as president reminds us of every problem he inherited from Trump’s term. We may have been ungrateful.
An X user shared an old TIME cover of President Biden’s first day in office, with a chilling caption: “Never forget what he had to clean.” The post made people revisit the legacy that Biden inherited from Trump, a legacy that left its mark on every corner of American life. We’ve been so preoccupied with the 2024 election that we rarely bring up how much damage Trump did. Maybe it’s time to do that. Let’s remind ourselves of what a Trump term looks like.
Trump’s final year decisions resembled a dystopian movie. One such example is Trump’s pardoning of Blackwater contractors involved in the 2007 massacre of Iraqi civilians. It’s hard to imagine that even Trump supporters agree with this. Add to this Trump’s veto of a bipartisan National Defense Authorization Act, withholding military pay raises, all while fixating on unrelated issues like doubling down on BLM protestors.
And who can forget the turbulent end of 2020? During a time when Americans were desperate for pandemic relief, Trump refused to sign the COVID-19 relief bill. This left millions hanging in suspense. Let’s just say that Trump’s pandemic legacy was marked by delays. He was late to enforce mask policies and travel restrictions. He was reluctant to distribute available vaccine doses. And, of course, the legendary recommendation to injecting bleach to kill the virus. So, when Biden came into office, he had to do all of the things Trump didn’t want to do. He provided relief, effectively distributed vaccines, and enforced the right policies.
Trump made a promise to “drain the swamp” during his 2016 campaign. Did he live up to this pledge? Well, he did just the opposite. Perhaps his most long-lasting legacy is corruption. Watchdogs identified over 3,700 conflicts of interest. This has to be a record. Trump used his seat in government to promote his properties. He signed executive orders at his Bedminster resort and bowed out of a G-20 summit to visit a Virginia golf course. Trump’s presidency often blurred the lines between public duty and personal gain.
This is just what people in power do, right? Nothing surprising. Well, Trump took it a step too far. He made Biden’s residency as hard as possible. He didn’t accept the results of the 2020 election, which incited an insurgency. As one X user pointed out, Biden didn’t even have access to “the most basic information and services.” Biden’s term was marked by this. His job was not to make progress but to fix Trump’s mistakes. And that’s just what Biden did.
Trump supporters often like to point out the state of the economy under Biden. But they fail to mention that the result of the economy was, in fact, Trump. The inflation we are dealing with right now is not a result of Biden’s policies. It’s a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Russia, and the bad policies under Trump. Biden was in every way set up. Let’s not forget how sneaky Trump was with the Afghanistan withdrawal. He negotiated a deal with the Taliban and didn’t announce this to the public. Biden found out about this deal once he got into office. So he had to make rash decisions. Trump, being who he is, continues to use this against Biden to this day.
Even if the sky was the paper and the sea was the ink, we still couldn’t write out the damage Trump did. Pardons for war criminals, last-minute reductions in Afghanistan, and many COVID-19 policy missteps. Let these be a reminder of what a Trump term looks like, and everything Biden had to deal with once he got into office.