The normalization of President Biden’s necropolitics is as new as the sky is blue. Already, I can hear the neoliberal back–to–brunchers briskly brandishing their rationalizing remarks — their ostentatious retorts of “reform.” Yet what these prideful preachers fail to grasp is the sheer fact that the Biden abomination — sorry, administration, is not a real repudiation of Trump’s but instead a perpetuation of his legacy…which, of course, was a mere continuation of the Obama administration and his antecedents’ undying devotion to capital exploitation and the white power structure.
Indeed, during Biden’s first 365 days, we’ve witnessed a grotesque perpetuation of racialized immigration policies. There’s been a continuation of kids in cages, yet the outrage is over. The total number of immigrants in detention centers has increased by over 50%. Mass incarceration remains, as political scholar Siddhant Issar posits, “a significant mechanism through which the state manages surplus populations and the social and economic crises precipitated by neoliberal restructuring.” This was undeniably evident in 2021, as Biden’s administration delivered over a million deportations (including the inhumane expulsions of Haitian asylum-seekers). The only figure matching that is the millions of dollars this administration has put towards police funding, in addition to the continued fostering of the Department of Defense’s 1033 program which maliciously militarizes the police, continuing to endanger the lives of Black and Brown peoples across the nation.
Last year, Kyle Rittenhouse’s verdict for the racialized murder of two men was met with well-warranted wrath. But I must ask, where is this energy for the executive-in-chief? Our modern American culture is remarkably prone to idolizing our political figures. Not only do we rationalize these ruling-class world-renowned killers, we regularly glorify them, putting them on a pedestal as if they aren’t indirectly facilitating the same violence which we claim to abhor (on a larger systematic scale at that). Rejecting abolition and de-carceral alternatives, we perpetuate our insistent urge to individualize systemic issues. In the face of interpersonal justice, we ardently advocate for incarceration rather than assessing material conditions and social contradictions on a broader structural level.
Peering out abroad, we’ve seen a perpetuation of imperialism as an imperative, with sanctions on Afghanistan and Venezuela and Cuba, and political destabilization attempts on Nicaragua. A perpetuation of AFRICOM, and the militarization of Afrika and the Middle East persists, continuing under the guise of “counterterrorism.” These sadistic sanctions and subversion machinations beget disastrous starvation, economic deprivation and senseless death.
And let us not forget the perpetuation of our planetary peril, as this administration’s lackluster cluster of climate change policies has only intensified the climate crisis as Biden issues large-scale permits for oil and gas drilling rivaling that of Trump’s first three years. Not to mention the avid increase in military spending (which remains one of the most significant contributors to the climate emergency) has resulted in $778 billion towards “defense” in the name of “Build Bombs Better” — sorry, “Build Back Better.”
Meanwhile, Biden’s supporters continue to perpetuate and plaster his placative reform policies as if they aren’t another rudimentary ruling-class strategy to temporarily resolve the inherent antagonisms within the capitalist system. Ultimately, none of these policies do anything to alter the material conditions of the working class or address the harrowing crises of housing and health care, education and the environment, all of which continue to be exacerbated during the pandemic.
You know, the pandemic… during which the Biden presidency has seen unprecedented levels of death and dismay as we surpass 1.35 million (recorded) cases (in a day). Despite vaccinations, 2021 saw more COVID-19 deaths than 2020. Now, the safety precautions many people took against coronavirus at the beginning of the pandemic have been thrown out the window. The pandemic wages on, yet those of us with privilege simply do not care as we stumble back into packed parties, stadiums and bars. It seems to me, especially as the new Omicron variant is prolonged, that for some all along, “prioritizing safety” through mask mandates, quarantining and other acts of collective care was a mere performative political maneuver manufactured by the (neo)liberal media apparatus in opposition to reactionary right-wing sentiments. Evidently, some saw the Biden victory and vaccinations as a route to “return to normalcy” in more ways than one. Yet since Inauguration Day, the pandemic and all of the social problems persisting prior to his presidency remain interminably perpetuated, augmented and amplified.
Of course, underlying all of this is the feeble collective forgetting that our president, much like his predecessors, is a former collaborator and current unapologetic sympathizer of segregationists, an architect of modern-day mass-incarceration, not to mention an alleged abuser — all of which was widely accessible information prior to Election Day.
And while nationwide disjunctive syllogism and the pervading false liberal-conservative dichotomy might be to blame for the dissonance then, we must now renounce our flawed allegiance to party politics and U.S. electoralism as a whole.
As Malcolm X once proclaimed, “Any time you throw your weight behind a political party that controls two-thirds of the government and that party can’t keep the promise that it made to you during election time and you’re dumb enough to walk around continuing to identify yourself with that party, you’re not only a chump but you’re a traitor to your race.”
If this is the case, then what can we do? We can start by asking ourselves how we might be actively contributing to harm in our every-day lives. What actions might we take that are oriented to the dictates of capital?
We can think more critically and consciously about the media we consume, the brands we endorse or the causes we rally behind. We may consider re-directing our career paths away from profit, away from exploitation, thus, re-affirming our commitments to justice by prioritizing the empowerment of all peoples in our professional pursuits. We might routinely ask ourselves how we can better situate our values and beliefs towards liberation in every aspect of our existence.
We can invest in community and collective care, mutual aid networks and revolutionary organizations (such as Black Alliance for Peace).
We can devote ourselves to habitually engaging with revolutionary readings and radical written works that have been so vigorously suppressed from mainstream discourse.
We can align our artistic passions and political perspectives in ways that push back against capitalist ideology and the white power structure.
We can begin all of this today. We don’t have to wait for a midterm. We don’t have to wait for 2024. We can reject the Biden abomination now.
MiC Columnist Karis Clark can be reached at kariscl@umich.edu.