In his inaugural address, President Joe Biden made a multitude of promises. He pledged to uphold the Constitution, defend America and provide a sense of security for the millions of Americans worried about their economic well-being amid the pandemic.

A year later, these grand promises have been exposed as nothing more than the empty rhetoric of a career Beltway politician.

Except for a costly “infrastructure” bill and the so-called “American Rescue Plan” Biden has largely failed to advance his extreme, unpopular policy agenda through Congress. Where he has made substantial policy changes through executive action the results have been disastrous.

Whether you look domestically, to our borders or beyond them, this administration has only built back chaos, uncertainty and misery.

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Let’s start with the economy: Americans are currently suffering from record-high inflation. In December, prices surged 7% compared to December 2020, the highest inflation rate in almost 40 years. Basic groceries and gas are eating up more of American families’ disposable income. Gas is 49% more expensive than a year ago, chicken 10.4%, and eggs 11.1%.

These rising rates are also far outpacing wage growth, effectively creating pay cuts for millions of American workers.

This historic inflation has been coupled with a crippling supply-chain crisis that has led to empty shelves and limited availability of all manner of products, sparking outrage on social media as seen with the recent #BareShelvesBiden phenomenon on Twitter.

The White House’s response has been elitist mockery—“the tragedy of the treadmill delayed,” as Press Secretary Jen Psaki dismissively declared in October.

And we haven’t even reached the bottom. As Heritage’s Joel Griffith recently wrote, we may be headed for the return of “stagflation,” the Carter-era phenomenon where higher inflation combines with economic stagnation to create misery for all but the wealthiest.

How about the border? The Biden administration inherited the most secure border in American history. With a handful of executive orders upon taking office, however, the administration undid effective Trump-era border security policies like the "Remain in Mexico program," asylum cooperative agreements with Central American countries and the construction of the border-wall.

The results have been devastating. Border Patrol agents have recorded more than 100,000 apprehensions of immigrants in the country illegally  every full month of the Biden presidency. Eight of those 10 months saw more than 170,000 apprehensions, with a peak of around 213,000 in July. For context, even the Obama administration considered anything more than 30,000 monthly apprehensions to be crisis level.

We’ve all seen the devastating images of tens of thousands of individuals huddled under bridges, crammed into overcapacity Border Patrol facilities and people running across an open border trying to evade law enforcement.

This crisis has been a national security, public health and humanitarian disaster.

The record number of narcotics like fentanyl pouring across the border are making their way into communities around our country, sparking even more misery. For the first time, drug overdose deaths in the U.S. topped 100,000 in 2021, and fentanyl and methamphetamines are driving that spike.

This crisis has turned every American town into a border town. It’s the worst border crisis in American history, and it didn’t have to happen.

And then there’s Afghanistan. No matter your views on U.S. involvement in Afghanistan, how the United States left mattered. Sadly, the Biden administration chose a completely arbitrary withdrawal date, hoping the president could score a political win on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.                   

What we got instead was an unmitigated disaster that cost the lives of 13 U.S. service members, embarrassed the United States on a global stage and shook our allies’ confidence in American promises.

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We trusted the security of U.S. and coalition forces at Kabul airport to a terrorist organization. We sparked a humanitarian crisis that led to Afghans falling to their deaths from military aircraft, clinging to them as the C-17s took off rather than remaining to be slaughtered by the Taliban.

The Biden administration’s policy moves were bad enough, but the aftermath revealed the shocking depth of the administration’s incompetence and apathy. As the Taliban advanced on and ultimately captured Kabul the president was silent for far too long. His national security adviser later admitted that Biden didn’t call a single world leader for days after Kabul fell.

Biden has long touted his “experience” in foreign policy, but when it mattered most he simply fell apart on the world stage, and Americans paid the price.

One year later, his failures speak for themselves.

But he’s built some things back—consumer prices, the drug cartels and the Taliban. Sounds like America needs a real rescue plan.