By George Ball

There is a relatively small but key demographic that Joe Biden needs to win if he wants to be President. That is, white middle-aged Republicans who, on the one hand, feel uneasy with the growing tendency among Democrats to simplistically define all of our lives through the prisms of race and gender and, on the other, have concluded that Trump will never rise to the responsibilities of his office.

I am part of that demographic.

Joe Biden has my vote for some of the reasons already detailed in this column,¹ and will very likely win this demographic.  But to decisively do so, he needs to explain hard things in a way that people can readily understand because it fits within their own life’s experience.

Hunter Biden’s relationship with Burisma is one of those hard things.  It has not recently been a focus of Trump’s often vicious, chaotic campaign for obvious reasons. But it may well again become one because – unlike many of Trump’s accusations – this one has substance.  One of the worst aspects of Trumpism is the misuse of power for personal gain. The then Vice President’s son being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars from a Ukrainian company that was obviously seeking to influence the father is a variation of that same unwelcome theme.

Joe Biden needs to be able to cogently explain how this happened to the American people, and so far, there is no indication that he is prepared to do so.  See https://www.vox.com/2019/12/5/20997462/joe-biden-hunter-ukraine-answer; https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/15/politics/joe-biden-hunter-ukraine-democratic-debate/index.html.

This is a delicate thing.  But it is also a doable one.  Because there are a lot of fathers out there who love their adult children and care deeply about them, without agreeing with or being proud of every decision those children make.  We understand that adult children do not always listen to their fathers’ advice, and that families are complex and at times delicate things, particularly in the aftermath of a tragedy like the untimely death of a son – or a brother.

We get all this, because we have (to varying degrees) lived it.

Mr. Biden should get out in front of this by acknowledging and explaining it.  He will not be punished for being a father. Or for his honesty, which would be a breath of fresh air and hallmark of authentic leadership.

¹ See https://www.insidernj.com/words-deeds-commander-chief/ and https://www.insidernj.com/voting-by-mail-trumpian-fiasco/