The US President intensifies his attacks on his predecessor only eight weeks before the end of the midterm elections, which witnessed a bitter competition.
US President Joe Biden accused Donald Trump and his supporters of “extremism” that poses a threat to democracy in the United States, and urged all Americans to help confront what he described as black forces within the Republican Party.
In a speech at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Biden accused his predecessor Trump and those who support the Make America Great Again (MAGA) agenda of being willing to overturn democratic elections, ignore the United States Constitution and “turn this country back” to a time without the right to abortion. privacy, contraception, or same-sex marriage.
“Republicans Donald Trump and the Maga represent extremism that threatens the foundations of our republic,” Biden said. “As I stand here tonight, equality and democracy are under attack. We don’t do ourselves a favor to pretend otherwise.”
The harsh rhetoric comes just two months before the United States heads to the polls in the hotly contested midterm elections that Biden has described as a crossroads for the nation.
Aides say the president is increasingly concerned about anti-democratic trends in the opposition Republican Party and factions allied with Trump.
Kimberly Halkett, Al Jazeera’s White House correspondent, said Biden was focusing on an area where Republicans were seen as weak, following the violent attack on the Capitol by Trump loyalists in January 2021.
“This is a deliberate strategy on the part of Democrats,” she said.
Biden, who has largely avoided referring to Trump by name during his first year in office, has grown increasingly vocal about his rivals in recent weeks and likened MAGA’s “philosophy” to “semi-fascism.”
Recognizing the potential dangers of such outright attacks, the 79-year-old Biden sought to balance his criticism with an appeal to traditional Republicans to make their voices heard, but Republican leaders on Thursday accused him of only shoring up political divisions.
“Instead of trying to bring our country together to solve these challenges, President Biden has chosen to divide, insult and belittle his fellow Americans,” House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said, referring to issues like crime and inflation.
I will not stand by
Some historians and legal scholars have described the political stakes in stark terms, saying that free elections and adherence to the rule of law are in the balance in the midterm elections.
They say losing Congress will not only make Biden a weak president, but also allow Trump sympathizers, some of whom have never accepted Biden’s win in 2020 and want to reform voting systems, to control the certification of the results of the upcoming presidential election.
Biden alluded to these concerns, saying, “I will not stand idly by and watch elections in this country be stolen by people who simply refuse to accept their loss.”
The speech reiterated Biden’s signed 2020 campaign promise to restore “the spirit of the nation” and, implicitly, purify the values associated with Trump. In the nearly two years since Biden’s election, Republican voters have mostly supported candidates allied with the former president; More than half say they think Trump really won the election.
Former Trump advisers and Justice Department officials testified that there was no evidence of any fraud or widespread manipulation of voting machines.
Judges, including those appointed by Trump, have dismissed dozens of lawsuits filed after the election, and Trump’s attorney general has called those lawsuits fictitious.
