Was Joe Biden a good president?

Joe Biden's presidency is widely debated — I'll gather a balanced look at his record, achievements, and criticisms.

Whether Joe Biden was a "good" president is subjective and depends on what criteria are weighted most heavily. Evaluations of his presidency from 2021-2025 generally describe it as mixed and consequential, with significant legislative achievements alongside major political vulnerabilities.

Legislative and Policy Record

As president, Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, CHIPS and Science Act, and Inflation Reduction Act in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent recession.

More specifically, his major legislative achievements include:

Other cited accomplishments include capping insulin costs and enabling Medicare drug price negotiation, enabling Medicare drug-price negotiations with initial drugs announced in 2023, and appointing roughly 235 federal judges over his term, with a majority women and a large share from non-white backgrounds.

On economic policy, his administration presided over consistent monthly job creation, while supporters also point to steps such as rejoining the Paris Agreement and WHO early in his term.

Foreign Policy

The administration worked to strengthen NATO and re-engage global institutions such as rejoining the Paris Agreement and WHO, and is credited by supporters with unifying NATO on Ukraine and strengthening alliances while navigating conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza.

However, the withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 produced bipartisan criticism for its execution and diplomatic fallout, and Biden also ordered the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021—a decision that would send his approval rating underwater for the rest of his presidency.

Economic and Political Challenges

Critics focused on:

Public Approval and Historical Assessments

Public approval was persistently low for much of his term:

Historical and scholarly assessments have diverged from public polling:

Competing Narratives

As one summary assessment notes, Biden’s presidency combined tangible policy accomplishments—massive pandemic relief, infrastructure investment, judicial appointments, drug-pricing steps and civil-rights advances—with pronounced vulnerabilities in crisis management, inflation control and immigration; proponents emphasize durable institutional changes and recovery-era measures, while critics stress operational failures and electoral consequences that may erase or reverse parts of his record.