President Joe Biden was adamant about the threat posed by Donald Trump’s attacks on the judicial system and elections during a Connecticut fundraiser Monday evening.
“It’s reckless and dangerous and downright irresponsible for anyone to say that it’s rigged just because you don’t like the verdict,” Biden said.
In a speech that was much more direct and confrontational than previous appearances, Biden pointed to a shift in Trump’s demeanor following his defeat in the 2020 election. “Something snapped in this guy—for real—when he lost in 2020,” Biden said.
Now Trump is “unhinged” and a much greater threat to the nation than when he ran in 2016 because he can’t admit to that loss.
“It’s literally driving him crazy,” Biden said.
Donald Trump was convicted on May 30 on 34 felony counts of falsifying business documents to protect his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump still faces 40 indictments in Florida for illegal retention of classified documents, 10 indictments in Georgia for attempting to change the outcome of the 2020 election, and four indictments in Washington, D.C., for conspiring to overturn the 2020 election.
Trump has repeatedly claimed that Biden was behind all these indictments, including those in state courts, but Biden has continued to distance himself from the process, insisting that he cannot comment on ongoing cases.
Throughout Trump’s indictments and his New York trial, Biden steadfastly refused to comment. But following Trump’s conviction, Biden made a statement from the White House on May 31, which included many of the same remarks he made on Monday.
The idea that Trump “snapped” following the 2020 election was also featured in a Biden Campaign ad that premiered in May with a statement from actor Robert De Niro.
Now that the first—and likely only to be settled before the election—of Trump’s cases has ended in conviction, Biden isn’t hesitating on calling him out. But it wasn’t until Monday night that much of the media seemed to notice.
In reporting on Biden’s speech, both NBC News and Fox News put “convicted felon” in quotes, presenting it as something Biden called Trump, which is inaccurate: Trump is a convicted felon.
Even if the corporate media’s response was filled with pearl-clutching, Biden’s team knows that it’s essential to stick to this tougher line, highlighting Trump’s 2020 loss, which caused him to “snap”; the fact that he is a convicted felon; and his attacks on the judicial and election systems.
“This isn’t the same Trump that got elected in 2016,” Biden told supporters. “He’s worse.”
Biden’s willingness to call out the threat Trump poses in 2024 is a necessary step in his campaign. Hard as it is to believe, many Americans still don’t understand what Trump is pushing or the threat that he represents. That’s because corporate media downplays Trump’s statements, doesn’t show the public the true nature of his speeches, and continually buries the danger of Trump behind a veil of “politics as usual.”
Only by addressing the hard truth about Trump can Biden break through the media’s “both sides” shell. And if that means that Biden, who would rather talk about the astounding accomplishments of his administration, is forced to spend his time going after Trump’s unsuitability for president, then that’s what’s going to happen.
Because, as Biden pointed out, the “threat that Trump poses would be greater” in a second term.
Every day brings a new prognostication that is making President Joe Biden’s campaign operatives worry or freak out. Is Donald Trump running away with the election? No. Not even close.
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