President Joe Biden decimated Donald Trump, his promises of authoritarianism and his attacks on American democracy in what is being called one of his “most powerful” speeches ever, from a stage just miles from historic Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.
“This may be the most powerful speech — just a few minutes in — Biden has ever given,” wrote The Messenger’s politics editor Marty Kady.
“He’s going at Trump by name and head on and I love it. And the country needs it,” observed former Republican U.S. Congressman Joe Walsh. “Republicans cannot defend what Joe Biden is forcefully calling out. They just can’t,” he added.
Biden, at times angry, and at times passionate, repeatedly tore into his likely 2024 political opponent, Donald Trump, in what The New York Times described as a “ferocious condemnation” of the ex-president in a “searing” speech.
“He refuses to denounce political violence. So hear me clearly. I’ll say what Donald Trump won’t. Political violence is never ever acceptable in the United States,” Biden said (video below), pointing his finger and speaking in an angry tone. “Never, never never. It has no place in a democracy. None.”
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“You can’t be pro-insurrectionist and pro-American. Trump his MAGA supporters not only embrace political violence but they laugh about it. At his rally he jokes about an intruder, whipped up by the big Trump lie, taking a hammer to Paul Pelosi’s skull, and echoing the very same words used on January 6: ‘Where’s Nancy?’ And he thinks that’s funny. He laughed about it. What a sick –” Biden said, stopping and holding himself back from name-calling, as the audience laughed and applauded. “My God.”
“I think it’s despicable. Seriously. Not just for a president but for any person to say that, say it to the whole world listening.”
“Trump’s assault on democracy isn’t just part of his past. It’s what he’s promising for the future. He’s being straightforward,” Biden added.
President Biden also blasted Trump for his election fraud lies, in what many appeared to see as one of the best lines from his speech: “I won the election, and he was the loser.”
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In another moment in which the President appeared angered, Biden said Trump “calls those who oppose him ‘vermin.’ He talks about the blood of Americans being poisoned, echoing the same exact language used in Nazi Germany. He proudly posts on social media the words that best describe his 2024 campaign: ‘revenge,’ ‘power,’ and ‘dictatorship.’ There’s no confusion about who Trump is, what he intends to do.”
“This speech was personal to President Biden. You could tell it in his tone and his words,” noted political strategist Chris D. Jackson, who has ties to the 2020 Biden presidential campaign. “Today, the President wore his Beau Biden Foundation tie, and directly after the speech, the song ‘A Sky Full of Stars’ by Cold Play was played. This song was one of Beau’s favorites and was played at his funeral. Beau was a patriot in every sense of the word and today he is smiling down, proud of the speech his dad just gave in defense of democracy in America.”
Watch the videos above or at this link.
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