President Biden on Friday delivered a ferocious condemnation of Donald J. Trump, his likely 2024 opponent, warning in searing language that the former president had directed an insurrection and would aim to undo the nation’s bedrock democracy if he returned to power.

On the eve of the third anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by Mr. Trump’s supporters, Mr. Biden framed the coming election as a choice between a candidate devoted to upholding America’s centuries-old ideals and a chaos agent willing to discard them for his personal benefit.

“There’s no confusion about who Trump is or what he intends to do,” Mr. Biden warned in a speech at a community college not far from Valley Forge in Pennsylvania, where George Washington commanded troops during the Revolutionary War. Exhorting supporters to prepare to vote this fall, he said: “We all know who Donald Trump is. The question is: Who are we?”

In an intensely personal address that at one point nearly led Mr. Biden to curse Mr. Trump by name, the president compared his rival to foreign autocrats who rule by fiat and lies. He said Mr. Trump had failed the basic test of American leaders, to trust the people to choose their elected officials and abide by their decisions.

“We must be clear,” Mr. Biden said. “Democracy is on the ballot. Your freedom is on the ballot.”

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  • hark@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    If you were alive at the time, you’d probably be telling black people to shut up and be happy with jim crow laws because that was the most progressive state of things since slavery.

    • Rusticus@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Don’t be an asshole and assume what I think about this. I’m not even a progressive and I know the way to get more progressive policies is to be positive about the accomplishments more than being negative about the failures. You fail and your approach is having the opposite effect that you want.

      • hark@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        I’m not assuming, I’m basing this off your posts. By the way, if you’re not a progressive and you’re not a democrat, then what are you?