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DELVE Briefing: State of the Democratic Primary and ’s Key Vulnerabilities

March 10, 2020

With Super Tuesday behind us and the historically large field of candidates winnowed down to a two-man race between Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders, the race for the Democratic nomination for president is entering its endgame. Analyses of how Biden saved the Democratic Party from an irreversible “leftward lurch” have flooded editorial boards and punditry. Politico founder John Harris has even declared Biden the winner of the general election, and Biden’s Super Tuesday showing has rekindled Democrats’ hopes of regaining a majority in the Senate and protecting their majority in the House. All of this exuberance seems quite familiar.

So how accurate is the Democrats’ sense of relief? Is Joe Biden really the moderate candidate he and the Democratic Party establishment advertise him to be? If Biden wins the nomination, will his “electability” argument survive Trump’s inevitable attacks on everything from Biden’s long career in Washington to his past tone deaf remarks on race to his penchant for touching other people in uncomfortable ways to the many scandals of the Biden family? Indeed, Biden’s own largess – accrued while ostensibly a public servant – not to mention the power-adjacent professional success of his family members dilutes Biden’s self-appointed claim to be “Middle Class Joe.” Similar to the turnout challenge of 2016, how will Sanders’ supporters react to their candidate’s second denial of the Democratic Party nomination for president?

All of these questions, and their implications for down ballot races, are worth considering, which is why the analyst team at Delve has put together the following briefing to help public affairs professionals navigate these challenges and opportunities.

EVEN WITH BIDEN AS THE NOMINEE, SANDERS’ POLICIES HAVE ALREADY WON

The Primary Fight Is Not Between Moderates And Progressives – It Is Between The Establishment And The Crusaders, All Of Whom Are Adopting Far-Left Policy Positions. All of the candidates have endorsed doubling the federal minimum wage to $15/hour (Tom Steyer wanted to go even higher, to $22/hour). All of the candidates support further expansion and intrusion of the federal government into health care, whether it is outright Medicare for All or the introduction of a government-run “public option” that will quickly crowd out private insurance offerings. All of the candidates want to erase the economic fuel provided by the Trump tax cuts DELVE Briefing: State of the Democratic Primary and Joe Biden’s Key Vulnerabilities and return to a non-competitive corporate tax rate that sends companies and investment dollars overseas and keeps them there. A number of the major candidates, including Sanders, Warren, Bloomberg, Buttigieg, and even Biden – who are supposedly spread across the ideological spectrum – have even proposed or endorsed a financial transactions tax that will discourage investment in U.S. public companies at a time when fewer and fewer companies are willing to go public and provide access to financial opportunity to a broad range of Americans.

Bernie Sanders Is One Of Two Democratic Presidential Candidates To Call For Jailing Fossil Fuel Company Executives – Joe Biden Is The Other One – And It Highlights How Far Left Biden Has Come In 2020. “Moderate” candidate Joe Biden has not resisted the leftward direction of Sanders’ Democratic Party. In addition to joining Sanders in endorsing imprisonment for corporate executives who engage in lawful commerce (and may not even have been at their respective companies when these alleged climate crimes occurred), Biden also calls for $6 trillion dollars in federal spending, including $1.7 trillion to move the U.S. to zero net carbon emissions by 2050. And although Biden does not endorse Medicare for All, his health care plan would spend $750 billion more on shoring up failing Obamacare over 10 years. To fund his policy plans, including his climate and health care plans, Biden proposes more than $3.4 trillion in new taxes, which is more than double what Hillary Clinton proposed in her 2016 presidential campaign. Although he is supposed to represent his party’s center, Biden’s policy proposals would still make him “the most progressive Democratic nominee in history.”

BIDEN LETS TRUMP RUN THE 2016 ANTI-ESTABLISHMENT PLAYBOOK ALL OVER AGAIN

Prepare For #ButBurisma To Enter The Democratic Lexicon. Since the 2016 campaign, as President Trump took office and began governing, progressive social media has been filled with the hashtag “#ButHerEmails” anytime Trump did something the collective left and media establishment deemed incompetent or abhorrent. If Biden is the nominee and Trump wins reelection, prepare to see “#ButBurisma” join the progressive social media barrage for the next four years. In 2016, Trump was able to successfully leverage Hillary Clinton’s private email server and her and Bill Clinton’s entanglement of their private interests and foundation with her public service as Secretary of State to convince many Americans it was time to disrupt the way business is done in Washington. With Biden as the nominee, expect a repeat performance from Trump.

The Reality Is, Biden Is No “Middle Class Joe,” Having Become A Millionaire While Serving In Government And Cashing In Even More Since He Left Office, And His Family Has Leveraged His Government Positions To Cash In Along The Way.

• Biden’s Brother James Biden Leveraged His Relationship With The Vice President To Win Billion-Dollar Contracts With The U.S. And Foreign Governments. In 2010, despite having little or no experience in construction, James Biden became the vice president of the large construction management firm HillStone International just as the company was looking to win a billion-dollar contract to build homes in Iraq. The contract was all set to generate $1.5 billion in revenue over three years but fell through in part due to HillStone’s lack of experience in homebuilding. But HillStone continued to get “significant contract work” in Iraq, including a six-year deal with the U.S. Army Corps of

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Engineers, and was awarded federal contracts for projects abroad, including in Mozambique. The son of HillStone’s founder explained it helps to have “the brother of the vice president as a partner” when looking to secure lucrative government contracts.

• Biden’s Son-In-Law Howard Krein’s Nascent Healthcare Consultancy Firm Scored Meetings In The Oval Office. Howard Krein, Joe Biden’s son-in-law, is the chief medical officer of StartUp Health, an “investment consultancy” firm. In 2011, the firm “was barely up and running when” two executives met with President Obama and Vice President Biden in the Oval Office. StartUp Health’s ability to meet with the most powerful leader in the world certainly helps market the company’s “high-level contacts.”

• Valerie Biden Profited Off Of Biden’s Campaigns. Valerie Biden, Joe Biden’s sister, was a senior partner at Joe Slade White & Company, a “political messaging firm.” The firm worked for various Biden campaigns for over eighteen years and received lucrative fees in the process, including $2.5 million during the 2008 presidential election.

None Of Biden’s Family Members Pose More Political Liability For His Campaign Than .

• Hunter Biden Flew With His Father To China On Air Force Two, Then Landed A Billion Dollar Investment From A Chinese-Government Controlled Investment Firm. In 2013 Hunter Biden flew with Vice President Biden on a diplomatic trip to China. 10 days after the China trip, Hunter’s private equity firm Rosemont Seneca created a $1 billion joint venture, called Bohai Harvest RST (BHR), backed by the state-owned Bank of China, which meant the son of the sitting U.S. Vice President was now in a business partnership with the Chinese government, and there was at least the appearance that the Vice President helped his son close the deal. During the China trip, Hunter introduced Vice President Biden to Jonathan Li, who became CEO of BHR after the deal was finalized.

• Hunter Biden’s Foreign Business Deals Extend Beyond BHR – And Beyond China. Despite having no experience in real estate, Hunter Biden was an advisor to Rosemont Reality, a sister company of Rosemont Seneca. Hunter once again secured a lucrative deal with a Chinese government-backed firm seemingly because of his last name. In 2015, a Chinese real estate conglomerate backed by the Chinese government “acquired a controlling stake in Rosemont Realty.” And part of the deal saw the Chinese firm promise $3 billion for commercial office property acquisitions in the U.S., “a major windfall for the company.” Hunter Biden’s questionable business deals were also not limited to China. Biden was tied to Burnham Financial Group, which brokered several “murky deals” involving oligarchs in Kazakhstan.

• Hunter Biden Was Awarded A Seat On Burisma’s Board Of Directors Despite Having No Experience In The Energy Sector, And Burisma Avoided A Corruption Investigation In Ukraine. Hunter Biden sat on Burisma’s Board of Directors while Joe Biden was serving as Vice President. In 2015, then-Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent raised concerns “with a senior official at the [Obama] White House” about Hunter Biden, who had no previous experience in Ukraine or natural gas, receiving his seat

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on Burisma’s board. Kent testified during the recent House impeachment hearings that he worried Ukrainian officials would believe Hunter Biden’s position at Burisma made him “a backchannel” to the Vice President. Kent also expressed his concern to Congress that Hunter Biden’s involvement with Burisma presented a conflict of interest for the Vice President, who at the time “was spearheading the Obama administration’s efforts to fight corruption” in Ukraine.

Indeed, in 2016, Vice President Biden, with the support of G-7 and IMF, pressured the Ukrainian government to fire Ukraine’s top prosecutor because he was not “aggressive enough” in fighting bureaucratic corruption. Hunter Biden’s ties to Burisma cast a shadow on the decision to fire the Ukrainian prosecutor, as the prosecutor had investigated Burisma’s owner for corruption. Even as his Super Tuesday momentum propels Joe Biden toward becoming the Democratic nominee, Republicans and President Trump are gearing up to overwhelm the media with Burisma narratives as November approaches. Just last week, Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) announced he is preparing to subpoena Andrii Telizhenko, a former Ukrainian diplomat who worked for Blue Star Strategies, which represented Burisma in the U.S.

• Hunter Biden Is Engrossed In An On-Going Child Support Case With A Stripper He Had An Affair With While Dating His Brother’s Widow. It sounds salacious and out of bounds for most campaigns, but don’t expect the Trump campaign to shy away from this ongoing scandal. In November 2019, a paternity test revealed Hunter Biden fathered a child with Lunden Alexis Roberts, who was a dancer at a Washington, DC strip club but now resides in Arkansas. The test came after Biden previously denied a relationship with Roberts, whom he allegedly had an affair with while dating his brother’s widow, Hallie Biden.

In January 2020, Biden temporarily agreed to retroactively pay child support, but an Arkansas Circuit Court lacked “sufficient information” to determine the correct amount of permanent child support Biden should be required to pay. The case remains ongoing because Biden has repeatedly failed to hand over “relevant financial documents.” On March 6, 2020, Roberts’ lawyers filed their third motion of contempt against Biden, after he again failed to present financial documents to determine his assets even as he rents a multimillion dollar Hollywood Hills mansion for $12,000 a month.

A different kind of candidate might shy away from attacking their opponent’s family, but is unlikely to hold back on the Biden brood even as more details on the above issues and additional examples of questionable enrichment surface between now and November.

IF IT’S 2016 ALL OVER AGAIN, WILL THE “BERNIE BROS” ONCE AGAIN HURT DEMOCRATS’ CHANCES?

In some ways, the 2020 Democratic primary campaign had the potential for a similar realignment in the Democratic voting base that Republicans saw with Donald Trump in 2016. And as with 2016, this realignment had the potential to throw out all of our assumed and conventional wisdom on who is likely going to vote and for whom they are likely to vote – if Bernie Sanders were to

Page 4 DELVE Briefing: State of the Democratic Primary and Joe Biden’s Key Vulnerabilities become the nominee. Now that such a scenario is less likely, does Sanders’ base get excited and turn out to vote for Joe Biden or do they stay home and not vote – or maybe even vote for Donald Trump? In 2016, as many as 12% of Sanders’ supporters voted for Trump over Hillary Clinton. In Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, “Trump's margin of victory over Clinton was smaller than the number of Sanders voters who” voted for Trump. Sanders’ voters’ dissatisfaction with the Establishment victory in the primary may once again provide an opportunity for Trump and Republicans in the general election.

The Democratic Party is counting on Joe Biden’s centrist image to carry the Democrats to huge electoral wins down the ballot. But as this briefing has shown, a closer examination of Biden’s policies and record raise significant questions about the Democrats’ case and provide opportunities for Republicans to exploit.

To delve deeper into how these developments in the presidential primary translate into your races down the ballot, contact us.

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