Presumptive President-elect Joe Biden and running mate Kamala Harris say a “reckoning on racial justice” is the first order of business now that Americans passed a “do or die moment” during the 2020 election.
Time’s ’Person of the Year’ duo recently sat down with the magazine to discuss the campaign, what it meant for the nation, and how best to unify the most politically divided populations.
“’Person of the Year’ is not just about the year that was, but about where we’re headed,” Edward Felsenthal, Time’s editor-in-chief and CEO, said in a video posted to its website. “The next for years are gonna be an enormous test of them and all of us to see whether they can bring about the unity they’ve promised.”
Mr. Felsenthal then asked Mr. Biden point-blank: “Do you think this is a do or die moment for democracy?”
“This moment was one of those do or die moments,” Mr. Biden replied. “Had Trump won, I think we would’ve changed the nature of who we are as a country for a long time. … The American people stepped up.”
The Democrat’s comment comes as multiple lawsuits regarding allegations of widespread voter fraud involving mail-in ballots appear headed for the U.S. Supreme Court.
Still, Time asked what a Biden administration’s top priorities will be moving forward.
“You have always been so action-oriented, so what is the first thing you want to do in that role?” Time National Correspondent Charlotte Alter asked Ms. Harris.
“We’re at a moment where we’re being confronted by many crises that have converged,” Ms. Harris replied. “We’re talking about a public health crisis. We are in the midst of an economic crisis, a long-overdue reckoning on racial injustice, and a climate crisis. We got a lot of things we need to handle and we multi-task to address them all.”
Ms. Alter anticipated that a Biden administration will be vastly different than “Hurricane Trump” and a team accused of “ripping through institutions, chewing up norms and spitting them out.”
“America bought what [Biden and Harris] were selling,” she wrote. “After the highest turnout in a century, they racked up 81 million votes and counting, the most in presidential history, topping Trump by some 7 million votes and flipping five battleground states.”
Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are TIME’s 2020 Person of the Year #TIMEPOY https://t.co/o97QNlSBrl pic.twitter.com/KuoBoebBN4
— TIME (@TIME) December 11, 2020
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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