President Biden kicked off his reelection bid Friday by ridiculing former President Donald Trump as a “loser” and calling his attempted political comeback something out of a “bad fairy tale” Friday, while comparing his own reelection bid of Biden with the heroic actions of George Washington and his troops in the Revolutionary War.
Speaking near Washington’s 1777-1778 winter camp at Valley Forge, outside Philadelphia, Biden sharply criticized both the likely Republican nominee and his congressional allies, claiming the latter group “abandoned democracy” after that “we almost lost America” during the Capitol riots on January 6, 2021.
Valley Forge “tells the story of the pain, suffering and true patriotism it took to make America,” Biden, 81, began his first proper campaign speech of 2024. “Today we meet in a new year, some 246 years later, just one day before January 6, a date forever etched in our memories because it was that day when we almost lost America, we lost everything.”
President Biden mocked former President Trump as a “loser” and called his bid for a political comeback something out of a “bad fairy tale” on Friday. AP
Backed by an enthusiastic audience, Biden lashed out at Trump repeatedly during the roughly half-hour speech, accusing his predecessor of intentionally using the violence of the Capitol riot as a tactic to stay in power and even comparing his rival, not for first time. to Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
The incumbent criticized his likely rival for opening a campaign rally last year in Waco, Texas, by performing a rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” by a prison choir from the Jan. 6 rioters.
“Trump’s attack on democracy is not just part of his past, it is what he promises for the future. It’s being simple. He is not hiding the ball,” Biden said.
“His first rally for the 2024 campaign began with a chorus of January 6 insurrectionists singing from prison into a cell phone while footage of the January 6 riots played on the big screen behind him at his rally. Can you believe it? This seemed like something out of a fairy tale, a bad fairy tale.”
Donald Trump speaks to his supporters on January 6, 2021. AFP via Getty Images
Biden enters this election year with approval ratings that rival the lowest of any modern president, and Americans collectively reject his handling of the economy, immigration and wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. As of Friday, the incumbent president was 2.2% behind Trump in the popular vote, according to a RealClearPolitics average.
Facing the prospect of an electoral disaster, Biden argued Friday that his own candidacy would continue America’s founding traditions established by Washington, including his peaceful relinquishment of power after two terms as president.
The Democrat also hit the jackpot on Jan. 6 to rally his party ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. Despite critics calling Biden’s message divisive, Democrats fared better than expected, They expanded their majority in the Senate and limited their losses in the House of Representatives.
“Let’s be clear about the 2020 election: Trump exhausted every legal avenue available to overturn the result, all of them. But the legal path simply brought Trump back to the truth that I had won the election and he was a loser,” Biden said to shouts and applause.
The president’s choice of the word “loser” was likely deliberate, given its frequently reported effect on Trump, a former reality TV host and image-conscious real estate developer.
Biden took advantage of the patriotic environment to argue that his own candidacy would continue America’s founding traditions established by Washington. AP
“Well, knowing how his mind works, he had one act left, one desperate act at his disposal: the violence of January 6,” Biden said, “and since that day, more than 1,200 people have been charged for his assault on En the Capitol, almost 900 of them have been convicted or found guilty.”
To more applause, he added: “Together, to date, they have been sentenced to more than 840 years in prison.”
No evidence has emerged that Trump had prior knowledge of plans for violence by some of his supporters during the counting of the Electoral College results in Congress.
In other comments on Friday, Biden said Trump could lead the United States into an era of dictatorship and that leaders of other countries have told him he “can’t win” because “my country will be at risk.”
“Well, knowing how his mind works, he had one act left, one desperate act at his disposal: the violence of January 6,” Biden said. REUTERS
“He calls those who oppose him ‘vermin’. He talks about Americans’ blood being poisoned, echoing exactly the same language used in Nazi Germany. He proudly posted on social media the words that best describe his 2024 campaign: “revenge,” “power,” “dictatorship.” There is no confusion about who Trump is and what he intends to do,” Biden said.
“You can’t be pro-insurgency and pro-American,” the president added at one point, insisting that, unlike Trump, “our campaign is about preserving and strengthening our American democracy.”
“The protection and preservation of American democracy will remain the central cause of my presidency,” Biden continued before directing his ire at Trump’s allies in Congress.
“As one Republican senator said, Trump’s behavior was embarrassing and humiliating to the country. Now that same senator and those same people have changed their minds,” Biden said.
Biden gave a speech to mark the third anniversary of January 6. REUTERS
“As time has gone on in politics, fear, money, everything has intervened and now these MAGA voices that know the truth about Trump on January 6 have abandoned the truth and abandoned democracy. They made his decision, now the rest of us (Democrats, independents, traditional Republicans) have to make our decision.
“I know mine and I think I know America’s.”
Biden’s Justice Department, through special counsel Jack Smith, is prosecuting Trump for his own actions in challenging the election, as well as for allegedly misappropriating national security documents after leaving office.
Trump, who argues that the cases brought by Smith are themselves undemocratic, issued a rebuttal of Biden through his campaign, saying that Biden is the one who has acted against democratic norms, including leaning on social media companies to censor political opinions.
Democrats themselves are guilty of “weaponizing the administrative state against a democratically elected president” by carrying out “partisan investigations into Russia,” the Trump campaign said, referring to investigations that consumed more than half of the presidency. of Trump with a steady stream of ties suggesting he conspired with the Kremlin in 2016.
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Source: vtt.edu.vn