Will Donald Trump or Joe Biden be better for race relations?

Joe Biden has a history of constructive engagement with minority groups

Question: Will Donald Trump or Joe Biden be better for race relations?
Position‹2 of 2: Joe Biden will be better for race relations
Argument‹2 of 4›: Joe Biden has a history of constructive engagement with minority groups

As senator and vice president, Joe Biden has worked with minority community leaders and has been endorsed by leading minority politicians. Biden served as vice president to Barack Obama and nominated Kamala Harris as his vice presidential candidate.

The argument

Joe Biden’s choice of Kamala Harris as his running mate would see her become the first Black and Asian American woman to hold the vice presidential office, if they are successful in the election. Biden has also fostered a long-term relationship with the Black community having served as vice president under Obama and advocating for civil rights legislation. Biden has also received the endorsement of influential Black congressman Jim Clyburn of South Carolina. Biden has also been endorsed by Voto Latino and Emgage PAC, which represent Latino and Muslim voters respectively. Biden’s campaign staff is also diverse - 46% of full time staff are of colour. His history of working successfully with people of colour shows that Biden is committed to establishing racial equality and improving race relations. With Harris as his vice, Biden will repair race relations in the US.

Premises

[P1]Biden chose Kamala Harris, who would become the first Black and Asian American woman vice president, and built a long relationship with the Black community as Obama's vice president. [P2] He has won endorsements from figures and groups representing Black, Latino, and Muslim voters, and nearly half his campaign staff are people of colour. [P3] This history of working successfully with minority groups shows a genuine commitment to racial equality. [C] Therefore, because Joe Biden has a history of constructive engagement with minority groups, he will be better for race relations.

Counter-arguments

Biden’s engagement with minority groups is symbolic and just for show - he has shown that he takes the support of communities of colour for granted and has not acted in their interests in the past. What is important is not endorsements or sharing a platform but results and tangible change; Biden is yet to deliver on this.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] A running-mate selection and years spent in an office are facts about a career rather than evidence about outcomes for race relations, and the premise does not say what the relationship consisted of or what it produced. [Rejecting P2] Endorsements record political support and the calculations behind it, and staff composition measures a campaign's hiring rather than what a government subsequently does. Neither is a measure of race relations, which is what the question asks about. [Rejecting P3] The inference from representation to commitment to results is the weakest link, and the counter puts the objection squarely. A full case would have to engage the record on both sides — the 1994 crime bill and the 2020 campaign remarks he apologised for, set against his civil-rights and voting-rights positions and the record of the administration he served in — rather than resting on who appeared on the platform.