President Joe Biden on Thursday used a dramatic primetime address to the nation to warn of the danger to American democracy posed by acolytes of former president Donald Trump and other GOP candidates who want to strip citizens of their most basic rights.
Standing on what he called the “sacred ground” of Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia — the place where America’s founding documents were debated and drafted — Mr Biden called the ideas embodied in that document, “equality and democracy” the “rock” on which the US was built.
The president warned that those ideas were now under attack.
“We do ourselves no favours to pretend otherwise,” he said. “ I’ve come to this place where it all began to speak as plainly as I can to the nation about the threats we face, the power we have in our own hands to meet these threats, [and] about the incredible future that lies in front of us if only we choose it”.
Mr Biden said Americans must “be honest with each other and ourselves” about the agenda being pushed by an extreme element of the Republican Party.
“Too much of what’s happening in our country today is not normal,” he said, adding that the man he defeated nearly two years ago — former president Donald Trump — and his “Maga Republican” allies “represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic”.
Mr Biden stressed that “not every Republican” subscribes to the “extreme ideology” of Mr Trump and his acolytes, but he warned that the GOP today is largely “dominated, driven and intimidated” by Mr Trump and “the Maga Republicans,” referring to Mr Trump’s and his “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan.
“That is a threat to this country,” he said.
The president warned that “Maga forces” to a time when American women could not choose whether or not to carry an unwanted pregnancy or legally purchase contraception, before any concept of a right to privacy was enshrined in American jurisprudence, and to a time when LGBT+ Americans could not marry the person of their choice.
The president’s remarks, which the White House has described as part of an official event and not as a campaign stump speech, also zeroed in the threats to democracy posed by Mr Trump’s followers, many of whom are running for office with the intent of refusing to certify any future electoral victories by Democrats.
“For a long time, we’ve reassured ourselves that American democracy is guaranteed. But it is not,” Mr Biden will say before exhorting Americans to “defend it,” “protect it,” and “stand up for it”.
While Thursday’s speech was not officially part of any political campaign, the subject matter and the timing have obvious political undertones.
Mr Biden’s remarks will be delivered just over five years to the day The Atlantic published an op-ed under his byline in which he said Americans were “living through a battle for the soul of this nation”.
Written not long after the violent “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, the then-former vice-president warned that the “giant steps forward” Americans had taken to deliver expanded civil rights to racial minorities, women, and LGBT+ people were being “met by a ferocious pushback from the oldest and darkest forces in America”.
Two years before he announced his 2020 presidential campaign, Mr Biden then castigated Mr Trump as “an American president who has publicly proclaimed a moral equivalency between neo-Nazis and Klansmen and those who would oppose their venom and hate” and accused him of having “emboldened white supremacists with messages of comfort and support”.
While the president is expected to once again take his predecessor to task, the White House has stressed that his remarks will also be positive and forward-looking.
Speaking at the daily White House press briefing on Thursday, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the president will be “optimistic” when he addresses the nation.
“He will speak about how he believes we can get through this current moment, this critical moment that we … are currently in,” she said. “He believes this is a moment where a lot is at stake”.
Ms Jean-Pierre added that Mr Biden won’t shy away from calling out “the extreme part of the Republican Party” and drawing attention to positions that are out of the mainstream with the American people.
“They want a nationwide ban on abortions. They want to give tax cuts to billionaires and corporations while raising taxes on middle class Americans. They are threatening political violence and they are attacking our democracy,” she said. “And so the President is going to take this time to talk to the American people … about … how can we continue to fight for our democracy and do it in an optimistic way, take that moment to give our people hope, because this President believes that we can turn this around”.