CV NEWS FEED // President Joe Biden addressed the 2024 Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Monday night.
During his speech, Biden claimed his policies as president were successful, repeatedly rebuked Republican nominee former President Donald Trump, and reiterated support for Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris.
“Are you ready to vote for freedom?” Biden asked. “Are you ready to vote for democracy and for America? … Are you ready to elect Kamala Harris and Tim Walz as president and vice president of the United States?”
“With a grateful heart, I stand before you now on this August night to report that democracy has prevailed,” the president said. “Democracy has delivered. And now democracy must be preserved.”
The country is “facing an inflection point,” he said. “One of those rare moments in history when the decisions we make now will determine the fate of our nation and the world for decades to come.”
“We’re in a battle for the soul of America,” he continued.
He claimed he ran for president four years ago because of “what he saw in Charlottesville in 2017. Extremists coming out of the woods. Carrying torches.” These rioters saw then-President Trump “as an ally,” Biden argued. “Hate was on the march in America.”
Biden stated he ran in 2020 “with a deep conviction in … an America where honesty, decency, dignity still matter.”
“We came together in 2020 to save democracy,” he emphasized. “Because of you, we had one of the most extraordinary four years of progress ever, period.”
“And when I say ‘we,’ I mean Kamala and me,” he clarified.
The incumbent president claimed that the country has “the strongest economy in the entire world” and that there had been a “record 60 million new jobs, record small business growth, record high stock market … inflation down and continuing to go down.”
“We finally beat big pharma,” he later claimed.
Biden also rebuked Trump’s assertion that the country “is losing” by continuing down its current path.
“He’s the loser,” the president said of his former opponent. “He’s dead wrong.”
Biden went on to claim that he and Harris “made the largest investment in public safety … ever,” causing violent crime to fall “to the lowest level in more than 50 years.”
“And crime will keep coming down when we put a prosecutor in the Oval Office instead of a convicted felon,” he added.
“Trump continues to lie to you about the border,” Biden claimed. He accused Trump of helping to derail the controversial bill he called “the strongest bipartisan border deal in the history of the United States.” Republicans at the time decried the fact that the bill in question proposed to earmark more funding for foreign policy priorities than border enforcement.
As a “result of the executive action I took, border encounters have dropped over 50%,” Biden claimed. “In fact, there are fewer border crossings today than when Donald Trump left office. And unlike Trump, we will not demonize immigrants.”
Biden went on to say he stands for “protecting … your freedom to choose,” referring to abortion.
“Donald Trump is going to find out the power of women in 2024,” Biden said. “As Trump and his MAGA Republican right-wingers seek to erase history, we Democrats continue to write history and make more history.”
“Folks, I got five months left in my presidency,” Biden said near the end of his speech. “I’ve got a lot to do. I intend to get it done.”
“It’s been the honor of my lifetime to serve as your president,” he continued. “And all this talk about how I’m angry at all these people who said I should step down. It’s not true.”
“Above all, we need you to beat Donald Trump and elect Kamala and Tim!” he exclaimed.
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The incumbent president took the stage over a half-hour after he was scheduled to speak due to previous speeches running longer than expected.
Biden was the final speaker during the first of the DNC’s four nights.
Before he ended his reelection campaign and endorsed Harris on July 21, Biden had been the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee for over four months.
Biden handily won almost every nomination contest during the Democratic primaries, receiving over 14 million votes in the process. However, Biden had only faced a group of long-shot candidates.
Partly due to Democratic primary voters overwhelmingly opting to stick with Biden, critics across the political spectrum called the party’s last-minute elevation of Harris to replace the withdrawn Biden “undemocratic.”
Harris was not a candidate in the Democratic primaries and remained Biden’s running mate at the time.