Biden scathingly attacks Trump in State of Union speech
Biden stated he wished to "wake up the Congress and alert the American people" to the risk at the dramatic opening of his address.
In his State of the Union speech on Thursday, March 7, US President Joe Biden unleashed a scathing attack on his "dangerous" competitor for the November presidential election, Donald Trump, claiming that US democracy is "assault"ed.
Biden stated he wished to "wake up the Congress and alert the American people" to the risk at the dramatic opening of his address.
He then focused on Trump, accusing the Republican of "bowling down" to Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia. To applause from Democrats, he declared, "I will not bow down."
Biden let his temper out and continuously referred to Trump as "my predecessor, a former Republican president" rather than by name.
Biden had a rare opportunity to present his case for reelection in front of his closest political supporters and opponents as well as a national television audience at the yearly set-piece presidential speech.
It was also a high-stakes test of his ability to think quickly, given that he was now 81 years old and the oldest US president in history. The test lasted slightly over an hour.
Biden was regularly heckled and jeered by Republicans, but he responded with humor that made fun of his opponents' positions on everything from their desire to lower taxes for billionaires to their indifference to climate change.
Cheers and cries of "four more years" greeted Biden as he entered the Capitol, which was packed with lawmakers, justices of the Supreme Court, and government officials.
But as a testament to the many obstacles Biden must overcome, including opposition from the Democratic left, demonstrators opposing his backing for Israel's war against Hamas attempted to obstruct the motorcade that was traveling from the White House to Congress.
In public polls, 77-year-old Trump leads Biden by a small margin. Though he reluctantly left the White House, he refused to return boxes of top-secret documents, and he is now facing numerous criminal accusations related to his attempts to overturn his election defeat in 2020.
Biden attacked Republican opponents of abortion in his speech, accusing them of having "no clue about the power of women in America" on what Democrats view as a crucial vote-winning issue.
Additionally, he praised the US economy, despite the fact that many Americans still feel negatively impacted by high prices and that their financial situation has not improved, according to surveys.
Biden stated that "in thousands of cities and towns the American people are writing the greatest comeback story never told" .
"I inherited an economy that was on the brink," he said. "Now our economy is literally the envy of the world. Fifteen million new jobs in just three years – a record. Unemployment at 50-year lows."
The Democrat took on the Gaza War, which infuriated the Arab-American community and leftists with Biden's ardent backing of Israel's endeavor to destroy Hamas.
In response to intense political pressure from members of his own party, he declared that he had directed the US military to establish a port on Gaza's coast in order to provide additional relief to the Palestinian people.
Prior to the address, Trump focused on the record number of migrants who had crossed the Mexican border, accusing Biden of causing "horrific devastation" in his three years in government.
But in his speech, Biden attempted to flip the situation on Republicans by criticizing them for blocking a bill that would have significantly tightened regulations.
