This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.

Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. In 2020, in the presidential campaign,

Joe Biden managed to unify the Democrats behind him as a reassuring figure in the

center of the party. And at the very same time, he put forward one of the most progressive

and transformational agendas ever seen in modern Washington. And now a year in, it's time to take

stock of the successes and the failures of this administration.

I'm going to turn things over now to staff writer Evan Osnos, who reports from Washington.

Evan covered Joe Biden's campaign, and more recently, he profiled West Virginia's Joe Manchin,

perhaps the second most powerful person in Washington right now. Here's Evan Osnose.

When Joe Biden came into office, it was a moment of extraordinary turmoil. It was just two weeks since the violence of January 6th. And under those circumstances, just a return to normalcy

would have been challenging. But he had all along been promising something more. I covered his

campaign, and over the course of it, Biden began to talk in larger and larger terms about what

was possible, the sense that the only way to push back Trumpism was for Democrats to go big

economically and politically.

There was something incredibly ambitious about that vision,

and I think to some it seemed impossible.

To others, it was an inspiration,

but he has really been wrestling with that ever since.

I called up my colleague, also a Washington correspondent, Susan Glasser.

Susan, President Biden didn't quite set out to be FDR, but he, I mean, he hung a portrait of FDR on the wall, the Oval Office, and he clearly invited the comparison. Looking at that now,

it feels like a very long time ago. And I wonder

what you make of those ambitions that he had as you look at it now. Well, you know, I guess,

...