Joe Biden

President Joe Biden speaks outside Independence Hall. In his recent speech, Joe Biden criticized MAGA Republicans in unsparing terms.Photograph by Evan Vucci / ...

[history](https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/vitalstats_ch2_tbl4.pdf) and [most of the evidence](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2022-election-forecast/https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2022-election-forecast/), to turn the midterm election, once again, into a referendum on Trump, and, in so doing, to save their control over the Senate and maybe even the House. How telling it is that, when the President of the United States today speaks of threats to the nation, he is warning not about adversaries abroad but the danger within. Arriving in Moscow a decade after the collapse of the Soviet Union, I often heard Russians I interviewed complaining about the upending of their world, with the attendant economic and social collapse, in ways that were strikingly similar to the complaints of many Americans today. The country is clearly in for another period of electioneering in which playing to the fears of one’s supporters will be just about all that matters. “Too much of what is happening today in our country is not normal,” Biden said, early in his speech, a statement that was both correct and wildly understated. Wade](https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/when-the-supreme-court-takes-away-a-long-held-constitutional-right), will be enough to overcome the odds in November. “It depicts the president of our nation, as he took to the airwaves and spoke about his fellow citizens as if they were sewer rats.” Rick Scott, the Republican Senate campaign chief, [tweeted](https://twitter.com/ScottforFlorida/status/1565521139778084867) the photo and dismissed Biden as a “raving lunatic” who “attacked half the country tonight.” [Mike Huckabee](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/28/prodigal-son), the former governor of Arkansas, [called it](https://twitter.com/GovMikeHuckabee/status/1565494783442915330) a “hate speech.” Over on Fox News, [Tucker Carlson](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/04/10/tucker-carlsons-fighting-words) was very, very angry about the “blood-red Nazi background” and the Marine honor guard in front of Independence Hall, a setting that he termed a “complete outrage.” Even before Biden spoke, [Kevin McCarthy](https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/its-not-news-that-mcconnell-and-mccarthy-are-craven-patsies-for-trump-but-the-danger-has-grown)—the House Minority Leader, whose slavish devotion earned him the sobriquet “my Kevin” from Trump—gave a [prebuttal](https://www.c-span.org/video/?522592-1/republican-leader-mccarthy-pres-biden-apologize-slandering-tens-millions-americans-fascists&live=), in which he said that the President should “apologize for slandering tens of millions of Americans as fascists.” Storming the Capitol and defying the will of the voters in 2020 was totally fine. [the ominous setting](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/01/biden-speech-philadelphia-extremist-republicans-threaten-democracy)—the front of Philadelphia’s Independence Hall at night, with dramatic red floodlights as the backdrop for the President while he spoke in dire terms about the possibility of political violence from the Trumpists who still refuse to concede Trump’s 2020 defeat, and who celebrate the violent mob that stormed the Capitol in hopes of overturning it. The current President may not have mentioned his predecessor’s name much, but Biden’s speech, as is the case with the rest of his Presidency, was all about standing against Trump and the unique threat to American democracy that he and his “Make America Great Again” supporters pose. In the inverted logic of Trumpworld, theirs is the grievance that matters. Vance](https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-political-scene/what-j-d-vances-victory-in-the-ohio-republican-primary-means-for-trumpism), the Trump-backed Republican nominee for Senate in Ohio, [tweeted](https://twitter.com/JDVance1/status/1565506626660048896).

Republicans complained that Biden was being "divisive" after spending years painting him as an illegitimately elected president.

They griped, for example, that Biden didn’t call for [“unity”](https://twitter.com/Jim_Jordan/status/1565507517190397952) [with](https://twitter.com/RepPatFallon/status/1565501546791665668) Republicans, even though a large swath of the party still doesn't accept him as a legitimate president. [whatever that means](https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1565467434521399298) — Biden’s assessment of the GOP’s MAGA wing and those who have enabled it is accurate. [claimed](https://twitter.com/kayleighmcenany/status/1565497300109107203) that Biden had given the “most divisive presidential speech” she’d ever seen. [conservative complaints](https://twitter.com/JDVance1/status/1565506626660048896); evidently, viewers were [“shocked”](https://www.foxnews.com/media/biden-shocks-viewers-hellish-red-background-polarizing-speech) by the color red, according to Fox. They also called him [“cynical”](https://www.foxnews.com/media/sen-kennedy-blasts-biden-politician-cynical-speech-age-does-not-guarantee-wisdom) for speaking out against a group of people who have spent the last six years cozying up to someone who appears to be [flagrantly corrupt demagogue](https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/08/donald-trump-criminal-investigations-lawsuits-guide-complete-list). Not only did they fail to receive the apology Kevin McCarthy [demanded](https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/01/politics/kevin-mccarthy-speech-biden/index.html) of Biden for labeling MAGA ideology as [“semi-fascism"](https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/08/biden-condemns-gop-semi-fascism) last week; they endured yet another round of criticism from the president, who warned that Trump and his followers “represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” Hell, one need only look to Pennsylvania, where Biden spoke, to see the right’s [hostility to democracy](https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/05/doug-mastriano-pennsylvania-republican-primary-democracy); Doug Mastriano, the Republican candidate for governor there, is essentially running on a platform that regards the will of the voters irrelevant to his own political desires. But democracy endures only if we, the people, respect the guardrails of the republic.” There was a dash of politics in Biden's address, of course, as he rattled off a few items on his administration’s impressive list of achievements. We have to defend it, protect it, stand up for it — each and every one of us,” Biden said Thursday outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia. To build the future or obsess about the past? The GOP — which spent years in a state of rapture as Donald Trump tarred journalists and political opponents as “For a long time, we’ve told ourselves that American democracy is guaranteed, but it’s not.

Biden aimed to showcase his faith in the military apparatus and its ability to back the democratic order. President Biden During Primetime Speech Outside ...

In 2020, [more than half of the military’s officer corps](https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2020/08/31/as-trumps-popularity-slips-in-latest-military-times-poll-more-troops-say-theyll-vote-for-biden/) said they strongly disapproved of the president, a phenomenon [likely explained](https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/mark-esper-s-book-says-he-thwarted-trump-s-hope-n1295062) by military officers’ attachment to legal norms and propriety, and their [relatively high levels of education](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/11/10/the-military-doesnt-love-trump-back-this-is-why/) (one of the most common predictors of opposition to Trump). Both Trump and now Biden have played with the symbolism of the military’s relationship with democracy in political oratory, but toward radically different ends: Trump wished to use the military to subvert democracy, while Biden hopes that the military will help protect it. The military's allegiance is to the state, not to a political party or leader. By placing Marines in his periphery, Biden aimed to showcase his faith in the military apparatus and its ability to back the democratic order — to defend against future attacks on the electoral system. [shoot protesters in the legs](https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-wished-his-military-officials-were-more-german-generals-nazi-n1297784), and they [covertly maneuvered](https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-wished-his-military-officials-were-more-german-generals-nazi-n1297784) to ensure a peaceful transfer of power as Trump manufactured lies about election fraud. Biden focused in his remarks on identifying Trump and his most hardcore supporters as a danger to the republic, with their disregard for democratic rule and their propensity for political violence. Milley,](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/i-should-not-have-been-there-milley-apologizes-role-trump-n1229876) the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in a now infamous photo-op during which the then-president [floated the idea of flooding the streets with troops](https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/6/1/21277530/trump-speech-police-violence-dc-tear-gas) to put down antiracist protests. It was an answer to Trump's attempts to thwart a peaceful transfer of power and mobilize the military against democracy during his tenure. [claimed](https://twitter.com/jeffzeleny/status/1565496320672108548) that the Marines, combined with a nearby Marine band that played as Biden took the stage, marked “a break with White House traditions.” That claim was rebutted by [many](https://twitter.com/AdamBlickstein/status/1565509690707959810) [critics](https://twitter.com/timjhogan/status/1565521913425928193), who pointed out that several previous presidents have used the presence of troops as part of their backdrop during notable speeches. So it’s worth contending with why the administration chose to have Marines so prominently displayed. And it was intentional — stagecraft is a major part of political oratory. But some political observers noticed something unusual: two Marines flanking him in the background as he spoke.

President Joe Biden last night used the backdrop of Philadelphia's Independence Hall to accuse his political opponents of betraying American democracy.

Trump changed the rules of politics. Trumpism is not the repudiated past of the Republican Party. If Republicans gain control of one or both houses of Congress in 2022, and in almost any state where they wield power, Trumpism is the country’s near-term future. He could have added that those threats were encouraged when Trump released information about the search at Mar-a-Lago and did not redact the names of the agents whose job it was to execute the search. But that was a mere courtesy, because he almost immediately added, “There’s no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven, and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans.” Biden presented the 2022 ballot question as a stark choice between right (his party) and wrong (the party that has become Trump’s party). Facing that reality is the way to prevent it from doing worse harm. Those fantasies have led two in five Americans to fear (or hope) that a second civil war could happen in the next 10 years, according to What once could be minimized as a recessive tendency within the Republican Party has become the dominant one. [slashing partisan interview](https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2022/08/13/trump-lincoln-memorial-fox-town-hall/) to Fox News from the Lincoln Memorial. That’s a reference to the “We’ve seen election officials, poll workers, many of them volunteers of both parties, subject to intimidation and death threats,” Biden said. He briefly drew a distinction between those Trump-loyal Republicans and the bulk of the Republican Party.

Former President Donald Trump bizarrely claimed that President Joe Biden's forceful rebuke of "MAGA Republicans" on Thursday was a threat to use military ...

"Joe Biden essentially declared all those who oppose him and his agenda enemies of the republic. He isn't actually interested in restoring the soul of the nation, he's only interested pitting his fellow Americans against one another." They do not recognize the will of the people," he said. "But Joe Biden crossed into a very dangerous, very dangerous place. That is not leadership," House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., gave a prebuttal speech on Thursday and argued that it was actually Biden who was waging an "assault on democracy." 6 committee also found evidence that Trump sought to use the Defense Department to ["seize" voting machines](https://www.salon.com/2022/01/22/jan-6-committee-obtains-executive-order-draft-that-called-for-voting-machines-to-be-seized_partner/) while contesting his 2020 election loss, though he ultimately did not follow through with the plot. "MAGA Republicans do not respect the Constitution. And that is a threat to this country." "But there's no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans. [threatening to use military force](https://www.salon.com/2020/05/29/trump-threatens-to-turn-the-military-on-protestors-when-the-looting-starts-the-shooting-starts_partner/) against racial justice protesters across the country in 2020. Not every Republican embraces their extreme ideology,"

"President declares half the country a threat to democracy," conservative radio host Erick Erickson tweeted after the president's speech on Thursday.

He described Jews in Germany as "parasites" and criticized democracies as "dishonest." On TV: Dark Brandon on his throne of human skulls." Some commentators have suggested the president could be playing into this meme now. In 1938, for example, Hitler addressed thousands of party supporters in the specially built site festooned with swastikas. [CNN](https://www.newsweek.com/topic/cnn) and [MSNBC](https://www.newsweek.com/topic/msnbc) love it. Or it's real." But there's no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans. Biden's face had also been changed to look like Hitler, complete with mustache. Not every Republican, not even a majority of Republicans, are MAGA Republicans. "I know because I've been able to work with these mainstream Republicans. [ Erick Erickson tweeted.](https://twitter.com/EWErickson/status/1565502737713856512?s=20&t=0d6XfrqUe8lp5AR-PSSPUA) Not every Republican embraces their extreme ideology.

Even on the day that President Joe Biden delivered his most jarring warning yet that democracy is in severe danger, Donald Trump teased how he might use a ...

Here as before, Trump is viewing the presidency as a tool of personal power to be used to reward his allies and to punish his political opponents. So far, Biden's tactic seems to be working as he grafts this strategy onto Democratic attempts to highlight the Supreme Court's overturning of the constitutional right to an abortion, which has galvanized liberal voters and enthusiasm in his party's base, and the recent passage of a significant climate and health care law. But this year, Trump effectively is on the ballot given his endorsement of many candidates whose main calling card is total loyalty to his false claims of voter fraud. He appears to be trying to turn the election into a Millions of people voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020 because they embraced his anti-establishment creed or his hostility to globalization. But he soon flew to Florida to make up with the ex-President on whom he seems to think GOP hopes of a House majority and his dreams of becoming speaker depend. "They see their MAGA failure to stop a peaceful transfer of power after the 2020 election as preparation for the 2022 and 2024 elections. Those fights have raged intensely and often with ill-feeling in a deeply divided nation, but they mostly took place between two parties who fundamentally respected the electoral system. While he was speaking as America's head of state, his remarks also sounded like a campaign stump speech, delivered in a critically important battleground state that he will have visited three times within the span of a week by Labor Day. Multiple courts and Trump's own Justice Department found there was no evidence that the 2020 was marred by massive fraud. It was a commentary on this era's fractured political times that the leader of the world's most powerful democracy would feel compelled to give such a speech at all. And Biden seems to have had a point.

In a prime-time speech in front of Philadelphia's Independence Hall, President Joe Biden called on Americans to &q.

Election Deniers Could Oversee Voting](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/03/us/politics/gop-election-deniers-trump-arizona-michigan.html), Aug. Hodges](https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/14-556), which guaranteed the national right to same-sex marriage. Some Senate Republicans have [expressed interest](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/04/us/politics/gay-marriage-bill-baldwin.html) in backing such a law. [passed](https://twitter.com/greggiroux/status/1549514054368215043?s=11&t=B4kz0kCiLYENyE3COfJmyg) the [Respect for Marriage Act](https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/8404/text?r=1&s=1), which would require that all states honor marriages, including same-sex marriages, that were legally valid in the states in which they were granted. Connecticut](https://www.oyez.org/cases/1964/496), the 1965 case that established a right for married couples to use [contraception](https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/aug/04/kat-cammack/gop-talking-point-suggests-birth-control-not-risk-/), the court found that the 14th Amendment’s due process clause protects the right to privacy. [wrote](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/24/us/clarence-thomas-roe-griswold-lawrence-obergefell.html) a concurring opinion when Roe was overturned that said the court "should reconsider" the 2015 ruling in [Obergefell v. Hodges](https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/14-556), which guaranteed the right to same-sex marriage nationally. [Public Religion Research Institute](https://ava.prri.org/#lgbt/2021/States/lgbt_ssm/2). (Single people were granted the right to contraception in a [separate case](https://www.oyez.org/cases/1971/70-17) in 1972.) Similar legal logic produced the 2015 ruling in [Obergefell v. As an example, the White House pointed to an Arizona bill that would give the state Legislature the power to accept or reject election results, but the bill did not pass. I do think anyone who calls for the use of violence, fails to condemn violence when it's used, refuses to acknowledge an election has been won, insists upon changing the way in which we rule and count votes — that is a threat to democracy." "Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic," Biden said Sept.

Joe Biden told us last night that American democracy is under attack. He did so in plain language and left no doubt about either the dire nature, or the source, ...

The optics of dictatorship: Joe Biden on The Spectator Australia | To be fair, US President Joe Biden makes a lot of gaffes – and that's when he is ...