Global Courant
US President Joe Biden has lashed out at his Republican rival Donald Trump, saying the former president’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) campaign is an “extremist movement that does not share the fundamental beliefs of our democracy.”
At an event honoring the late Sen. John McCain in Tempe, Arizona, Biden said Thursday that while not all Republicans are joining the movement, the party is currently “powered and intimidated by MAGA Republican extremists.”
“If their extreme agenda is implemented, it will fundamentally change the institutions of American democracy as we know them,” he said.
Biden has made protecting democracy and state institutions a key part of his 2024 re-election bid as the country’s presidential race gains steam.
The Democratic president hopes to create a contrast with Trump, his Republican predecessor.
Cindy McCain, wife of the late Senator John McCain, greets President Joe Biden on stage at the Tempe Center for the Arts in Tempe, Arizona (Evan Vucci/AP Photo)
During his speech, Biden barely mentioned Trump, who is currently the clear frontrunner for the Republican Party’s 2024 nomination. But Trump loomed large in the comments, as Biden referred to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, both directly and indirectly.
“Democracy means rule of the people. No rule over monarchs, no rule over money, no rule over the powerful,” Biden told the audience at the Tempe Center for the Arts.
“Regardless of party, that means respecting free and fair elections. Accept the outcome, win or lose.”
Trump has long maintained, without evidence, that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him through voter fraud.
He currently faces four criminal charges, two of which relate to his efforts to overturn his 2020 loss to Biden. Trump has denied wrongdoing in all four cases.
Biden also alluded to the increasing political violence in the country, a phenomenon typified by the deadly attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.
During that attack, thousands of Trump supporters converged on the Capitol, attacked law enforcement and breached the building in an attempt to stop the certification of the 2020 election results.
An approximate one 1,146 participants have been arrested in the years since, with 657 pleading guilty to federal charges.
Trump has been criticized for his inaction during the January 6 attack, ignoring calls for intervention. Finally, after hours of violence, he released a Twitter video calling on rioters to leave the Capitol, though he repeated his false claim of election fraud.
“Go home. We love you. You are very special,” Trump told the rioters in the video. “I know how you feel.”
Biden seemed to focus on these types of comments in Thursday’s speech.
“Democracy means rejecting and rejecting political violence. Regardless of party, such violence is never, ever, ever acceptable in America. It is undemocratic and should never be normalized to advance political power,” he said.
Biden also accused Trump and his allies of leading with “vengeance and vindictiveness,” stretching the limits of the U.S. Constitution to further political ends.
He said “extremists” within the Republican Party are “advancing an idea that the defeated former president advanced during his time in office.” That idea, Biden continued, is that the president is “above the law, no limits to power.”
“Trump says the Constitution gave him, quote, the right to do whatever he wants as president, end quote,” Biden continued. “I’ve never heard a president say that in jest.”
As the Republican Party moves rightward, Biden appealed to the political center with his speech, detailing his friendship across the aisle with the late McCain, a Vietnam War veteran and Republican.
“We’re like two brothers. We would argue,” Biden said, repeating a theme he has spoken about in the past. ‘I mean: really attack each other. And then we had lunch together.”
Trump has previously made controversial comments about McCain, questioning whether the late senator could be a “hero” if he were a prisoner of war: “I like people who haven’t been captured, okay?”
Arizona, previously a Republican stronghold, has increasingly become an important swing state. In 2016, Trump won Arizona. In 2020, Biden did just that, turning the state blue for the first time since the 1990s.
Al Jazeera’s John Hendren said Arizona will be crucial in the likely 2024 rematch between Biden and Trump.
“There are three states where most analysts say Republicans should win,” Hendren explained from Tempe. “They say Republicans need to win Georgia, Wisconsin and Arizona.”
Joe Biden honored the late Senator John McCain at his funeral in Phoenix, Arizona, on August 30, 2018 (File: Brian Snyder/Reuters)
Hendren also highlighted the fact that Biden’s speech comes against the ongoing debate over federal spending — and a fast-approaching September 30 deadline to pass budget legislation.
If Congress fails to pass a budget bill, all non-essential government functions will be halted, while federal programs and paychecks for workers will be suspended.
“As he spoke, the government is facing a looming shutdown led by MAGA extremists in the Republican Party,” Hendren explained. Biden, he added, was asking the nation: “What do we want to be?”
“You can see this is a shot across Donald Trump’s bow, and it’s the loud cry of Biden’s campaign for the coming year,” Hendren said.
