We now know that the presidential election in November is going to be between Donald Trump and Joe Biden with Howie Hawkins and Jacob Hornberger, both of whom are leading in their respective primaries, likely playing on the wings for the Greens and Libertarians respectively. Now is the time that we can finally start to speculate about how this election will go, despite the more than eight months wait we have until the start of November. But that’s not entirely what I wanted to write about today.

I feel like this piece will be an ‘INB4’ piece and this is why. If Biden loses in November he will have no one to blame but himself and that’s the case for any high-profile candidate running for office, especially the presidency.

Now, I say this is an INB4 piece because I know, for an absolute fact, that there will be a lot of establishment supporters who will blame Bernie Sanders, the left wing of the Democratic party or hell even independents if Biden loses against Trump. But guess what? Biden doesn’t deserve to have Bernie’s support automatically fall in line behind him. If you want those Bernie supporters, you need to work for them.

Trump worked for Republican voters in 2016 by embracing pretty traditional Republican policies and values, mostly leaning into the economic and religious talking points and such related policy positions. Yet, Trump also made sure to make his platform and opinions varied. I can still remember Trump responding to a question about trans-individuals using bathrooms (Because of the whole deal with North Carolina’s bathroom bill) and Trump responded pretty simply by saying, and I’m paraphrasing here, ‘Let them use whatever bathroom they want, it’s none of our business’. Then there was his comments about not cutting social security, medicare or medicaid. Despite whether or not Trump went back on those issues that he pandered towards more moderate voters on is irrelevant. He got elected and that’s what mattered most.

So, what about Biden? I’ll say this much upfront, I think that Biden has a much greater chance of adopting some of Bernie’s policy positions, or at least some variation of them, than Clinton did. Say what you will but Clinton hates Sanders. Biden on the other hand seems to be friendly with the Vermont senator and sure there are disagreements but there isn’t nearly the same level of animosity between them as there was between Clinton and Sanders. Obviously Biden doesn’t agree with Bernie’s platform and vice versa, but that’s what the primary was all about and now its time for Biden to actively work to win over Sanders supporters.

Regarding policy, Howie Hawkins (Remember that Green party presidential candidate I mentioned?) has a platform much closer to Bernie’s than where Biden’s stands right now. It would, logically speaking, make more sense for left-leaning Sanders supporters to support the Green party in the 2020 vote than it would be to vote for Biden and the Democrats from a policy perspective. Biden needs to make sure he makes those concessions to the Bernie camp and win their support over. If Biden just expects to have Sanders’ voters handed over to him on a silver platter he’s going to be sorely mistaken come November.

Young voters will vote Democratic overwhelmingly. That is if they go out to vote. Biden needs to get them to the polls by offering some of the polices that attracted so many voters to Bernie in the first place. Biden needs stronger climate change goals (2050 targets aren’t going to cut it), ensure he pushes for a strong public option for healthcare (At minimum) and revamp his position towards foreign affairs by promising to end the wars overseas and pull back militarily (American’s are overwhelming opposed to overseas wars at this point).

No politician deserves to have your support unconditionally and it’s unreasonable for them to expect to have your support by default. No politician is worth voting for if they won’t work for your vote and make real concessions. If there is one thing that Clinton did in 2016 that really screwed her over it was her disregarding the first and most important rule of politics: Don’t Abandon Your Base. She abandoned the Democratic base, especially left-wing voters, in favour of those unreachable moderate Republicans. Biden needs to do the complete opposite and shore up his base first and never abandon them.

If Biden loses in 2020 it won’t be Bernie’s fault, it won’t be the left’s fault and it won’t be young people’s fault. It’ll be Biden’s fault alone and he needs to do everything he can to ensure he doesn’t lose.

Curtis Fric Owner and operator of the non-partisan Polling Canada and Polling USA accounts. See author's posts