Joe Biden promised unity in 2020 but failed to deliver.

Joe Biden has oft presented himself as the great uniter. He ran on the promise to unite the nation in 2020, and he has touted his success ever since – all the while calling Donald Trump and anyone who supports him divisive. Meanwhile, the former president has added two lifelong Democrats – Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard – to his transition team. Could this be the unity Biden promised all along?

Not the Unity He Wanted …

Back in 2022, Liberty Nation News Senior Political Analyst Tim Donner made a pertinent point: “Voters don’t like it when you deliver the opposite of what you promise.” In 1988, George H.W. Bush said at the Republican National Convention: “Read my lips, no new taxes!” He reversed that policy in 1990, and come 1992, it cost him re-election.

Biden spoke of unity throughout his campaign, his inauguration speech, his State of the Union addresses, and numerous other comments and remarks in between. But what he delivered was something quite different. “And now we can’t help but wonder if Democrats will pay a steep price, as Bush did,” Tim Donner wrote. Flash forward a couple of years, and it seems they very well might. For Biden, re-election is no longer an option – the best he can hope for is that his vice president and replacement in the campaign, Kamala Harris, can beat Trump.

But, in a manner of speaking, one can say that Biden kept his promise to unite the nation. While he never missed an opportunity to lambast the former president and his followers – even in the midst of a unity speech – the steady march to the left his administration and the Democratic Party in general has taken over the last several years has left many feeling politically homeless.

Under what other circumstances would one expect to see a lifelong Democrat from Hawaii leave the party and join the Trump transition team? In what world would anyone have expected a Kennedy to first run as an independent against an establishment Democrat, then abandon that campaign and actively work with Trump and MAGA Republicans?

In being so divisive and unwilling to actually work with Republicans in a truly bipartisan way, Biden created the very trans-party unity he always promised – just not quite in a way he expected or wanted.

A Winning Strategy?

And this new unity in the Trump transition team – co-chaired by former Democrats RFK Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard, along with JD Vance and the former president’s sons – might be a winning strategy. While some in the GOP lament the decision as a sellout, those who do want a less divided nation can’t deny Trump’s willingness to work with pretty much anyone.

Whatever roles Kennedy and Gabbard eventually play in a Trump government, should he win, their presence on the campaign now does seem to improve his chances. RFK Jr. suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump in August, withdrawing himself from any swing state that would let him off the ballot, but he encouraged his supporters in non-competitive states – both red and blue – to vote Kennedy. He has since reversed that. “No matter what state you live in, I urge you to vote for Donald Trump,” RFK Jr. wrote in a fundraising email. “The reason is that is the only way we can get me and everything I stand for into Washington, D.C., and fulfill the mission that motivated my campaign.”

Kennedy has since removed himself from the ballots in Ohio, South Carolina, Florida, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming, and has ended his bid to get on the ballot in North Dakota. One might notice the trend there: Each of these states is considered a lock for Trump already. Of course, removing himself from states in which Trump was already expected to win handily doesn’t change the electoral outlook, but it’s worth noting that he has yet to remove himself from any deep blue states in which he might still act as spoiler against Kamala Harris.

He has, however, succeeded in leaving the ballot in more of the swing states that had initially denied his petitions. Michigan and North Carolina – with 15 and 16 electoral votes, respectively – both saw rulings Friday, September 6, ordering Kennedy’s name struck from the ballots. Whether that hands the states to Trump remains to be seen, but any boost in voters from the Kennedy camp certainly won’t hurt his chances. How ironic, then, that the unity Biden always promised but never delivered – at least not directly – might very well be what costs his party the White House now.