Whoever thought that former Senator Joe Biden would emerge as a serious challenger to U.S. President Trump in the 2020 Presidential race! Even three months ago Trump looked much ahead in the race against any Democratic nominee.

Things were going well for him as the US economy was doing well, a US-China trade deal was in the making and his white supremacist voters were intact. This was before the outbreak of Coronavirus, which struck the world all of a sudden.

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Trump initially dubbed it as the ploy of the Democrats but soon realized it was much more serious. Now he is faced with the worst ever crisis and a test of his leadership. ‘Sleepy Joe’ as Trump calls Democratic aspirant Joe Biden is trying to seize this opportunity.

According to a national CNN poll this week, Biden is commanding a 11 point lead over President Trump with 53 per cent support of registered voters compared to Trump’s 42 per cent. The poll said that Biden’s advantage is partially due to the coronavirus crisis.

Biden is critical of Trump for his handling of the virus and vowed recently, “No president can promise to prevent future outbreaks. But I can promise you this: When I am president, we will be better prepared, respond better, and recover better.”

Biden’s campaign has also announced a detailed plan about how he would address the pandemic. Coronavirus has given the chance to Biden to demonstrate his leadership, his experience and his ability to unite Americans. With the global economy in tatters the Democrats believe that if you are going to live by the economy, you can also die by the economy.

Both presidential candidates have their pluses and minuses. Both are septuagenarians representing different ideas on various issues like health care, abortion, handling the coronavirus pandemic, foreign policy etc. Trump has the advantage of being the incumbent. He also has a huge campaign chest.

He gets his support from his party, white voters and seniors, while Biden enjoys his support from Democrats, women, black voters and young people. Name recognition appears to be a major success factor for Biden this time. He had contested twice earlier and lost (in 1988 and 2008).

Now coronavirus has become an issue and will have a telling effect on economy and health, and the chances of both. Now that the picture is clear who will be better for India – Trump or Biden? South Block has always believed in doing business with whoever wins. Did not Prime Minister Modi do business with Obama and Trump with equal ease?

This time, of course, he was criticised for indicating support to Trump with his ‘Howdy Modi’ show in Houston in September last and later while hosting the Trumps in India two months ago. The US President is hoping that Modi would influence his supporters to vote for him calling him “my good friend Modi’, though Indian-Americans traditionally support the Democrats.

Indo- US relations have reached a new high during the Modi regime and a Trump victory would ensure the continuation of the functional ties though some issues like trade continue to be irritants. Biden is also not new to India as he has built deep relations with South Asian countries, particularly India during the Obama days and even before.

Biden’s support to India has been consistent. As a ranking member he spoke for India during the Pokhran days in 1998 and argued for engagement with New Delhi in the Senate Foreign relations committee. When he became the chairman of the committee later, Biden was for lifting sanctions against India. He also supported the Indo-US nuclear bill.

A White House official in a background briefing before his visit to New Delhi in 2013 said that the Vice President was “looking not just at the months ahead or the years ahead, but the decades ahead.” Biden himself revealed his Indian connection during his vice presidential visit to Mumbai in 2013.

“It turns out,” Biden said, “his great, great, great, great, great grandfather,” by the name of George Biden was a Captain in East India Trading company. After retirement, Biden said George Biden decided to settle in India and married an Indian woman.”

There are five Bidens living in India. If Biden chooses Senator Kamala Harris for his running mate, she has an Indian mother and an African father. Harris dropped out of the White House race in December and ended up endorsing Biden a few weeks ago.

Biden’s list for strengthening ties with India include climate change, nuclear proliferation and cyber warfare. Being a strategic thinker, Biden might be able to take the ties to a higher level. Though it is too early to predict the presidential poll results, whoever win, bipartisan support from the US is likely to continue.