What would a Biden presidency look like?
26 October 2020, 15:10 | Updated: 26 October 2020, 15:11
What would a Biden presidency look like?
What would a Biden presidency look like? Lionel Barber puts this to American political scientist Ian Bremmer on brand new LBC podcast What Next? with Lionel Barber.
As the US election campaign draws closer to its final moments, Lionel Barber asked Mr Bremmer what the White House would look like with a 77 year old, Democratic president.
Mr Bremmer said that the result will be contested either way as "half of the population will just not accept large pieces of the outcome" - even if Mr Biden wins by a landslide "which looks more plausible now than it did weeks ago."
He predicted with the Democrat as leader, "there will be a sea change in US domestic policy-making on climate, on redistribution of wealth, on taxation, on healthcare, on immigration.
"It'd be very much a social democratic orientation, more progressive than Biden himself had been in Senate or with Obama."
Mr Bremmer acknowledged that Mr Biden rejects "a number of these cri de cœur of the progressives", such as breaking up the technology monopolies, ending fracking or defunding the police - "but the Democratic Party has shifted and the needs of the country has shifted," he said.
He continued that coronavirus has meant that a small number of wealthy people around the world have greatly benefited, such as Amazon owner Jeff Bezos who is worth almost $200 billion.
"Yet the majority of Americans are not and that suffering is going to get worse in 2021, than it has been with all of the relief and support within the last 9 months," he said, "internationally I think that Biden and Trump are not of a piece, but are much more aligned."
Listen to: What Next? with Lionel Barber
