Former Vice President Joe Biden faced a growing backlash Wednesday from several of his 2020 Democratic opponents, including Sens. Cory Booker, Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris, for naming two Southern segregationist senators as examples of people with whom he had major disagreements but still “got things done” within the Senate.
Biden cited the late Sens. James Eastland of Mississippi and Herman Talmadge of Georgia at a fundraiser in New York on Tuesday night to back up his claim that one of his greatest strengths was to “bring people together.”
“I was in a caucus with James O. Eastland,” Biden said, briefly imitating the senator’s Southern drawl, according to pool reports. “He never called me ‘boy,’ he always called me ‘son.’”
He called Talmadge “one of the meanest guys” he ever knew but said: “At least there was some civility. We got things done.”
“We didn’t agree on much of anything,” Biden continued. “But today, you look at the other side, and you’re the enemy … we don’t talk to each other anymore.”
He said he knew many people in his party thought that attitude made him too “old-fashioned” to be the Democratic nominee to take on President Donald Trump in 2020.
“Well, guess what. If we can’t reach a consensus in our system, what happens?” he said. “It encourages and demands the abuse of power by a president.”
Biden’s remarks drew criticism that gained steam Wednesday. Booker, who has made unity and love a key message throughout his presidential campaign, was one of the highest-profile figures to come out against Biden.
"You don’t joke about calling black men ‘boys’,” he said in a statement. “Men like James O. Eastland used words like that, and the racist policies that accompanied them, to perpetuate white supremacy and strip black Americans of our very humanity.”
“Vice President Biden’s relationships with proud segregationists are not the model for how we make America a safer and more inclusive place for black people, and for everyone,” Booker wrote. He added that Biden is someone he “respects,” but said Biden shouldn’t use the Southern senators as examples of people who brought unity to the country.
The New Jersey Democrat also called for the former vice president to issue “an immediate apology.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said on Twitter that he “agrees” with Booker, noting the importance of a Biden apology as the Trump administration tries to “divide us up with its racist appeals.”
Harris (D-Calif.), who would be the party’s first African American female nominee, also responded, characterizing the remarks as “misinformed and wrong.” She told POLITICO that she has a “great deal of respect” for Biden but that “to coddle the reputations of segregationists, of people who if they had their way, I would literally not be standing here as a member of the United States Senate.”
The wave of rebukes signal a possible trend ahead of the Democratic primary in which candidates, including low-tier contenders, are not afraid to tear into their party’s current front-runner.
Another contender, former Rep. John Delaney (D-Md.) took a jab at Biden on Wednesday afternoon, writing: “Evoking an avowed segregationist is not the best way to make the point that we need to work together and is insensitive; we need to learn from history but we also need to be aggressive in dismantling structural racism that exists today.”
Similarly, Warren (D-Mass.) told The Washington Post, “I’m not here to criticize other Democrats, but it’s never OK to celebrate segregationists. Never.”
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio also bashed Biden’s comments in a tweet, saying, “Eastland thought my multiracial family should be illegal & that whites were entitled to ‘the pursuit of dead n*ggers.‘” He shared an early photo of his family; de Blasio’s wife is black and their children are biracial.
“It’s past time for apologies or evolution from @JoeBiden,” de Blasio added. “He repeatedly demonstrates that he is out of step with the values of the modern Democratic Party.”
As the backlash heated up, other Democrats who aren’t vying for the presidency weighed in. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, took a swing at Biden, writing on Twitter: “@JoeBiden, what DID you get done with segregationists? I know about how you worked with them to block school bussing to integrate schools. What other horrible stuff did you manage to build consensus on?”
Later on Wednesday, Ocasio-Cortez told POLITICO: “If you ignore racism and if you don’t address issues of race with racists then everything is fine, right? That’s how you work with segregationists: by not confronting the racism and their institutionalization of second-class citizenship and a lack of full recognizing African Americans.”
The New York Democrat added that “one thing I hope we’ve learned from 2016 is that it’s not just enough to speak to Republican voters. We need to speak to people who are so jaded about politicians that they need to believe that someone will fight for them.”
Jason Miller, who worked on Trump’s 2016 campaign, wrote that “Biden was a terrible candidate in 1988. He was a terrible candidate in 2008. He’s a terrible candidate now in the 2020 race.”
“This is why I continue to believe Biden is the dream general election opponent for @realDonaldTrump,” Miller said.
Biden’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment about the growing criticism.
However, in a string of tweets, Biden’s senior adviser Symone Sanders went after critics who blasted Biden for “praising a segregationist.”
“That is a disingenuous take,” she wrote. “He basically said sometimes in Congress, one has to work with terrible or down right racist folks to get things done. And then went on to say when you can’t work with them, work around them.”
She also scoffed at President Donald Trump. “Let’s be honest here,“ she wrote, “a person currently sits in the White House who has ACTUALLY praised white supremacists, refuses to acknowledge the innocence of the #exonerated5 and talks about criminal justice reform, but has yet to allocate ONE PENNY to it in his budget.”
The top adviser also noted Biden’s track record on civil rights, highlighting his work on marriage equality, and praised “the man who literally launched his 2020 campaign calling out Nazis in Charlottesville along with Trump’s equivalency.”
Despite progressives who pounced on Biden’s comments, more than a half-dozen members of the Congressional Black Caucus were quick to defend the former vice president on Wednesday, telling POLITICO that the remarks were taken out of context.
The highest-ranking African American in Congress, House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), said, “You don’t have to agree with people to work with them.” Clyburn, Biden’s longtime friend, is gearing up to host his annual fish fry event this weekend. Biden and nearly all of the Democratic hopefuls are set to attend.
Only one of the CBC members interviewed by POLITICO pushed back on Biden’s comments.
“Segregationists at their core are those who believe in white superiority and black inferiority,” Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) said. “There can be no compromise with someone in this day and time as someone who would define themselves as a segregationist.”
Biden has touted his commitment to civil rights and his strong relationships in the African American community, where he has enjoyed strong support so far in the 2020 race. His close ties to the CBC run deep, stemming from his 36-year tenure in the Senate, as well as his time as vice president under Barack Obama.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich also came to Biden’s defense, and noted on Twitter that Biden is being “honest“ about working with the senators he “deeply opposed on segregation.”
“He is failing the left’s test that you have to erase the past and lie about it,” Gingrich added.
Biden has previously pointed to his time working with segregationists in the Senate, with whom, he emphasized, he had stark disagreements, to show that he could find common ground with Republicans in Congress if he is elected president.
That emphasis on working together has irritated many in his party, who say it was Republicans who refused to work with former President Barack Obama, not the other way around.
Biden has also appeared out of step with progressives, some of whom are embracing Sen. Bernie Sanders’ vision of democratic socialism, in the way he approaches economic issues. The former vice president told the crowd at his Tuesday fundraiser, which included financial industry executives and attorneys, that he would not “demonize” the wealthy as president, saying “rich people are just as patriotic as poor people.”
But he also said workers are in a tough spot in the U.S., forced to sign noncompete agreements with employers that he said were “suppressing wages” by preventing workers from changing jobs and criticizing mandatory arbitration rules that keep employees from suing when their rights are violated at work.
“You all are extremely successful people,” Biden said. “But with all due respect, Wall Street didn’t build America. The wealthy didn’t build America.”
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