Joe Biden Warns That Trump Is an ‘Existential’ Threat to ‘Marginalized Groups’
Former President Joe Biden accused President Donald Trump of being an “existential” threat to “marginalized communities” and trying to “dismantle” the Constitution in a fiery Thursday speech at a Chicago lawyers gala.
Biden spoke at the National Bar Association’s 100th annual gala in Chicago where he received the C. Francis Stradford Award, which is named after a founder of the of the organization.
“Not since those tumultuous days in 1960s has this fight been so existential to who we are as a nation, with marginalized groups so dramatically under attack,” the former president told the cheering crowd, then walking them through his experience during the ’60s civil rights movement, as well as his move from being a prosecutor to a defense attorney.
The former president focused on Trump’s battles with various judges in his first months of his second administration, assuring the crowd that those he appointed would stand for “rule of law.”
“Folks, in all our lives, the life of our nation, there are moments so stark that they divide all that came before from everything that followed, moments that forced us to confront hard truths about ourselves, our institutions, and democracy itself,” he said. “We are, in my view, at such a moment in American history, reflected in every cruel executive outreach, every rollback of basic freedoms, every erosion of long-standing, established precedent.”
The former president accused the Supreme Court of enabling Trump with rulings favorable to him, and took issue with the administration’s mass deportation efforts.
“I think a lot of Americans are starting realize the pressure we’re under with this guy as president,” he said. “Get ready, folks, this is just starting.”
Biden warned the crowd of “dark days” under the current president.
“[The Executive Branch] seems to be doing its best to dismantle the Constitution. I’m being deadly earnest, man,” Biden said about Trump. “These are dark days, but you’re all here for the same reason I left that prestigious law firm to go to the defender’s office years ago. It’s because our future is literally on the line and we must be unapologetic of fighting for the future.”
Watch above via CSPAN.
