In a rare prime-time address, Vice President Joe Biden slammed Donald Trump and the “MAGA Republicans” and called on the country to stand united against the enemies of American democracy.
A crowd of several hundred people were seated in white lawn chairs in Philadelphia’s Independence Historical Park as Vice President Joe Biden ascended the stage at 8 o’clock on Thursday night, with the red and blue lights of Independence Hall shining brightly in the background.
“This is where the United States Constitution was drafted and debated,” Biden added. Here we launch the greatest experiment in decentralised democracy worldwide has ever seen.
However, “as I stand here tonight, equality and democracy are under siege,” he concluded. “If we try to fool ourselves, we will only be hurting ourselves. So, tonight, I’ve come to this spot where it all began to speak as honestly as I can to the nation about the risks we face, about the power we have in our hands to meet these threats, and about the magnificent future that lies in front of us if we choose it.”
While criticising Republicans who refuse to accept the results of the 2020 election, defend those who stormed the Capitol on January 6, and want to strip away abortion rights and other privacy concerns, the president specifically named his predecessor in the Oval Office.
It’s not natural what’s happening in our country right now, he remarked. The core foundations of our nation are in danger because of Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans.
Pres. Biden: “Too much of what’s happening in our country today is not normal. Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” https://t.co/ARxiYL3o54 pic.twitter.com/ttpqDid2HJ
— ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) September 2, 2022
By saying, “not every Republican accepts that extreme philosophy,” Biden distinguished the so-called MAGA Republicans from other conservatives.
I know because I’ve worked with these moderate Republicans,” he continued. But there’s no denying that Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans have taken control of the Republican Party today and scared its members into submission.
Biden’s urgent rhetoric is consistent with his messaging for the upcoming 2020 election, in which he positioned himself as a stark contrast to Trump and the election as a pivotal moment in the country’s history.
On Thursday, he reminded the gathering of this parallel, saying, “Now America must choose to move forward or move backwards, to build a future concerned about the past, to be a nation of hope, unity, and optimism, or a society of fear, division, and of gloom.”
After white nationalists and counter-demonstrators clashed in Charlottesville, West Virginia in 2017, administration officials hinted that Biden’s address would be an extension of his “spirit of the nation” message, which Biden said had prompted him to seek for president.
On Thursday, Biden urged his citizens to reject political violence and fulfil their “obligation and conscience” by standing up to extremists.
“We are still, at our core, a democracy,” he continued, “but history shows us that blind adherence to a single leader and a propensity to participate in political violence is fatal to democracy.”
Biden will be making his second of three stops in the swing state of Pennsylvania this week with his appearance in Philadelphia.
Biden attacked MAGA Republicans for their reaction to the attack on January 6 and the FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home during a speech he gave Tuesday at Wilkes University, defending the administration’s plan for policing and crime prevention.
“Whose side are you on, please? On whose side do you find yourself? “Biden, enraged, inquired.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, speaking in Scranton (Biden’s hometown) hours before the president hit the stage in Philadelphia, provided a preemptive response to Biden’s remarks on behalf of the GOP.
The president has previously branded the worldview adopted by MAGA Republicans as “semi-fascism,” prompting McCarthy to slam Democrats on inflation, crime, and the border before demanding Biden “apologise for slandering tens of millions of Americans as fascists.”
Those “tens of millions of hardworking people, loving families, and law-abiding citizens” whom Biden “vilified for merely seeking a better, safer, and more affluent country” are “the essence of America,” according to McCarthy.
When asked who he thought was the essence of America, McCarthy said, “the law-abiding, tax-paying American citizen.” “The heart of America is the resolve of its people to get up and go to work every day, to care for their families, to love their children, to be involved in their education, and to put America and the American people first at all times,”
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