Tipsheet

Is Joe Biden for Real With This 'Unity' Speech on How 'Our Politics Has Gotten So Angry?'

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  December 23, 2022 7:00 AM

On Thursday afternoon, President Joe Biden delivered his "Christmas Address to the Nation" with a theme of "unity." It was a speech filled with cheer and good tidings that you'd expect to be included in a message about Christmas. It was also nonsense considering who was delivering it. 

Early on in his speech, Biden mentioned how "the message of Christmas is always important, but it’s especially important through tough times, like the ones we’ve been through the past few years," going on to mention how some of those "tough times" applies to politics.

"Our politics has gotten so angry, so mean, so partisan.  And too often we see each other as enemies, not as neighbors; as Democrats or Republicans, not as fellow Americans.  We’ve become too divided," he lamented.

It's stunning that the president would dare to complain in such a way when he's the one responsible. While he portended to run for president in 2020 to unite the country, something he doubled down on at his inauguration, that didn't turn out to be the case. Almost from the start polls showed that the American people doubted his ability to "bring the country closer together."

In the months leading up to the November midterm elections, Biden and his administration demonized political opponents by referring to them as "MAGA Republicans," which caught on among fellow Democrats and their allies in the mainstream media.

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That demonization really ramped up when Biden gave a speech on September 1, outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia. It was supposed to be about " the Continued Battle for the Soul of the Nation," but instead came to be about doubling down on the "MAGA Republicans" insult and how they, along with former and potentially future President Donald Trump "represent an extremism that threatens the very foundation of our republic."

Such language continued for the months ahead. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-GA), though he loathed the tactic, told Fox News in the morning after the election that he believes such rhetoric may be a reason why Democrats fared so much better in the midterms than expected. 

Even after such a midterm performance, Biden and the White House still feel the need to claim that our democracy is supposedly under attack.

So, it's really no wonder, then, that "our politics has gotten so angry, so mean, so partisan" and "we've become too divided."

Yet still, Biden later in his speech went on to dare say that "I hope this Christmas season marks a fresh start for our nation, because there is so much that unites us as Americans, so much more that unites us than divides us."

The "tough times" mentioned in his speech also applied to COVID. In expressing hope to do with the Christmas season and for the year to come, however, Biden claimed that "COVID lon--no longer controls our lives," similar to remarks he made during a "60 Minutes" interview in September when he emphasized that "the pandemic is over."

Despite the president sending these kinds of messages, though, he and the administration continue to browbeat people into getting their boosters--annually now, like the flu shot. While receiving yet another booster in late October, the president himself painted a rather grim, doom and gloom kind of picture about people not getting up to date on vaccines, just as he had done in the past.

White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha has been particularly fierce when it comes to insisting that people must get their boosters, even going so far as to claim that "we know we can prevent nearly every death from COVID if people get their updated vaccines," which is why they "continue to press that message." Mia fact-checked that claim as "false" last week. 

As is typical for Biden at these addresses, he took no questions after the Christmas speech on "unity."