Biden Calls Trump and MAGA Republicans a Threat to Democracy in Primetime Address

President Joe Biden labeled Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans a threat to democracy in a primetime address Thursday at Philadelphia’s Independence Hall.

Summary

President Joe Biden labeled Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans a threat to democracy in a primetime address Thursday at Philadelphia’s Independence Hall.

• President Biden, flanked by uniformed Marines in “a break with White House traditions,” alleged the “extreme ideology” of Donald Trump “threatens the very foundation of our republic” and is “not normal.”
• The President accused his opponents of being willing to overturn elections, ignore the Constitution, and trying “to take this country backward.” Biden said, “Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”
• Speaking in Scranton before Biden’s speech, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy called on Biden to apologize. McCarthy said, “President Biden has chosen to divide, demean and disparage his fellow Americans. Why? Simply because they disagree with his policies. That is not leadership.”
• Biden’s speech is part of the Democratic strategy to elevate former President Donald Trump and turn November’s midterm elections into a choice between Biden and Trump, instead of a referendum on the incumbent’s performance on inflation, immigration, and the economy.

• POLITICO noted that although White House officials insisted the speech would not be “overtly political,” “it was difficult to read it as anything other than Biden’s attempt to frame the stakes of an election once again dominated by Trump after an FBI search of his Mar-a-Lago home turned up classified information and intensified talk of possible criminal charges.”
• The Washington Post observed recent polling found majorities of Americans are worried about the state of American democracy, including majorities of both Republicans and Democrats. Republicans are more worried about election fraud, while Democrats are concerned about voter suppression.
• The New York Times wrote Biden’s attempt to elevate “threats to democracy” as a key midterm issue instead of the economy is a risky bet and a “possibly stupid position” at a time when a majority of Americans rate the economy as the most important issue.

• FOX News noted many mainstream media reporters criticized the President for the partisan nature of his supposedly non-political address only to be mocked by the White House’s communications team on Twitter.
• The Washington Examiner covered Trump’s response to Biden’s speech. The former President characterized Biden as “insane” or “suffering from late stage dementia” and wrote if Biden doesn’t want to Make America Great Again, then “he certainly should not be representing the United States of America.”
• National Review argued Biden’s condemnations of political violence and threats against poll workers and FBI agents ring hollow as Democrats “have come under fire repeatedly since 2020 for endorsing political violence, first amid the nation’s racial reckoning after the murder of George Floyd and later when the Supreme Court overturned Roe.”

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© Dominic Moore, 2022