Joe Biden’s Bet That 2016 Didn’t Change Everything

PHILADELPHIA—If the new rules of politics post-2016 were to hold up, the official launch rally Joe Biden held here on Saturday would mean that he is in trouble: The crowd wasn’t huge, was largely white and older, and, for the most part, only really got into it when he mentioned Barack Obama or Donald Trump. Biden’s campaign is a bet: that in the four years since Trump launched his campaign, the country hasn’t changed, the Democratic Party hasn’t changed, and politics hasn’t changed. Trump and Bernie Sanders were the breakout candidates of the last presidential election, but unlike most of the other people running, Biden and his aides haven’t adjusted to that reality—because they don’t accept that it is reality.