No sooner had Democratic hopeful Joe Biden assured us in a video that "I get it" than he proved that he didn't—at least not yet. At issue were several women who had come forward in recent weeks to say that Biden’s physicality with them, however it was intended, made them uncomfortable. So instead of releasing a video this week that might have announced his 2020 candidacy, Biden released a two-minute explainer seeking to acknowledge that his touchy approach to interacting with the world is out of step with the political moment ushered in by the #MeToo era.
"Social norms have begun to change," Biden affirmed, "they’ve shifted, and the boundaries of protecting personal space have been reset and I get it. I get it. I hear what they’re saying.”
That was Wednesday. By Friday, Biden was on stage in Washington addressing the largely white male audience of an electrical workers union, but he may as well have been in a locker room, yukking it up with his buds who were all in on the #MeToo joke. After greeting and hugging Lonnie Stephenson, president of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Biden joked, "I just want you to know, I had permission to hug Lonnie.” Attendees laughed and applauded, which clearly encouraged Biden to take another whack at the topic later in the speech after he put his arm around a young boy he had invited up on stage. “By the way, he gave me permission to touch him," Biden jested again to similar chuckles from the crowd.
Frankly, it's stunning that a guy struggling to address concerns about his history of space invasions and promising to do better could deliver such a terribly tone-deaf performance in the same week he pledged to turn the page. It just reeks of privilege and insensitivity. Biden not only wiped away his non-apology apology, he publicly ridiculed an entire movement against sexual harassment and assault that seeks to elevate and value women and their experiences.
In fact, at the very moment Biden was lampooning those efforts, one of the women who had suffered a Biden transgression had a very nuanced op-ed at the Washington Post explaining her conflicted feelings about a picture of her and then-Vice President Biden that went viral on social media. Sofie Karasek had been one of about 50 survivors who took the stage at the 2016 Oscars to raise awareness about sexual assault. Biden had introduced the performance and later, as Karasek shared a story with him about a survivor who had taken her own life, Biden took her hands in his and touched his forehead to hers.
"I was taken aback," Karasek wrote. "I averted my eyes, hoping my body language could shorten the interaction." Karasek described the moment as "unwelcome, uncomfortable and strange" and yet, when the photo went viral, it helped raise the profile of the very issue she felt so passionate about. In one sense, she was proud of the impact it made, in another she was haunted by the feeling that she wasn't being honest about her own experience in the moment.
It's such a classic conundrum for people who feel they have been inappropriately touched, violated, or even assaulted. Do they just let sleeping dogs lie and try to move on, or do they call out their aggressor and ask him or her to take responsibility for their actions—in effect, to share the burden of the discomfort they have been shouldering alone?
Karasek made the bold choice to speak up, speak her truth, and ask Biden to "truly take ownership" of his actions. In the piece, she called on him to acknowledge his role in the mistreatment of Anita Hill during the 1991 Clarence Thomas hearings. "Joe Biden often calls on others to have the courage to speak the truth," Karasek wrote. "I hope that he can find it within himself to do the same."
After Biden's dismal performance during Friday's electrical workers speech, his handlers reportedly urged him to go out and address reporters—presumably to do a little clean up. Asked if he was sorry for his actions, Biden gave a sorry-not sorry response.
"It wasn't my intent to make light of anyone's discomfort," he said. But pressed by reporters about women like Karasek who want him to apologize for past actions, Biden declined. “I’m sorry I didn’t understand more,” he offered. “I’m not sorry for any of my intentions. I’m not sorry for anything that I have ever done. I have never been disrespectful intentionally to a man or a woman."
Following the event, a small twitter debate erupted over whether Biden's jokes were a gaffe or a strategy, which some observers seemingly thought was the more charitable interpretation. But the idea that it was a strategy seemed worse to me, especially in this political moment, following midterm elections where female volunteers, voters, and candidates lifted the Democratic party to historic wins in 2018. Indeed, some analysts expect female voters to account for 60 percent or more of the Democratic primary electorate in 2020.
If applying the salt of locker room humor to a gaping wound in the #MeToo era is a strategy, it's a strategic misstep in my view. As CNN analyst Ronald Brownstein pointed out, whether Democratic voters support the #MeToo movement (as polls suggest) and whether they find Biden's behavior disqualifying are two separate questions. "The answer may split the party by generation," Brownstein added.
But what Democrats need in 2020 is a candidate who inspires across generational, gender, socio-economic, and racial divides, not one who splits them, catering to one audience one moment and turning their back on them in the next.
"I'll be much more mindful, and that's my responsibility, and I'll meet it," Biden promised in his Wednesday video. That went well.