| Advertisement |
Jan. 8 (UPI) -- President Joe Biden called the "big lie" about the 2020 election the "second lost cause" and renewed his push to curb gun violence in a speech Monday at Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C. Lies and truth were the prevailing theme of Biden's second big speech this election year, days after an impassioned speech in Pennsylvania rebuking former President Donald Trump.
Advertisement
"This is a time for choosing, so let us choose the truth," Biden said Monday.
Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church is the site where nine Black parishioners were gunned down by a white supremacist nearly nine years ago.
"On June 17, 2015, the beautiful souls -- invited a stranger into this church to pray with them," Biden said. "The word of God was pierced by bullets and hate and rage. Propelled by not just gunpowder, but by a poison. A poison that for too long has haunted this nation. What is that poison: White supremacy. It's a poison that throughout our history has ripped this nation apart."
Biden again called for gun reform legislation, citing the recent shooting at a high school in Perry, Iowa, that killed 11-year-old Ahmir Jolliff and wounded seven others.
"My response is we have to stop it so your children, family and friends can leave home, walk the streets, go to the store, go to church and be safe from gun violence," Biden said. "There's no excuse for this carnage."
He renewed his call for a ban on assault rifles and high-capacity magazines, as well as the implementation of universal background checks.
The president recalled attending the funeral service at the church days after the shooting as then-President Barack Obama delivered a sermon and sang Amazing Grace.
"You changed hearts. You did something that may not have happened if it hadn't been for your courage," Biden said. "You brought down the Confederate flag in South Carolina. And you helped the nation heal."
Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley was governor of South Carolina when the Confederate flag was removed at the statehouse. Biden responded to Haley's recent response to a question about the cause of the Civil War, to which she said "freedoms and what people could and couldn't do" and did not mention slavery.
Haley is one of three Republican presidential candidates to qualify for the fifth primary debate on Wednesday, along with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Trump.
Haley's explanation is in line with what is referred to as the "Lost Cause" or the "Nobel Cause" that downplays the role of slavery in the cause of the Civil War.
"It was a lie that had terrible consequences. It brought on Jim Crow," Biden said. "So let me be clear for those who don't seem to know. Slavery was the cause of the Civil War. There is no negotiation about that."
Biden called the disproven claim that the results of the 2020 presidential election were illegitimate the "second lost cause."
"People are trying to turn a loss into a lie," he said. "If allowed to live, it will bring terrible damage to our country."
The president again evoked the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, condemning Trump and some Republicans who have claimed it was a "peaceful protest."
"Losers concede when they lose. And he's a loser," Biden said, referring to Trump.
The Biden campaign continues to emphasize Trump's "flirtation with White supremacy" while warning of his grave threat to democracy as demonstrated by his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.
Biden further warned that Republican politicians seek to "erase history," referring to legislation aimed at removing teachings about slavery and America's history with racism from classrooms in multiple Republican-led states.
"Every stride forward is met with ferocious backlashes from those who fear the progress," he said.
Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., introduced Biden, lauding him for appointing more women of color to federal circuit courts than all other presidents combined.
"Joe Biden will appoint more justices like Ketanji Brown Jackson," Clyburn said. "He will block any attempt of Republicans to institute a nationwide ban on women's reproductive rights. Joe Biden will fight any attempt to turn the clock back."
Biden's speech was briefly interrupted as protesters shouted for him to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, where an Israeli bombardment has killed more than 23,000 Palestinians, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health. One protester shouted "If you care about the lives lost here, you should honor the lives and call for a ceasefire in Palestine." A group of protesters then began to change "Ceasefire now."
The protesters were eventually drowned out by chants of "Four more years."
The president responded that he understands their passion and said he is "quietly working with the Israeli government to get them to reduce and significantly get out of Gaza."
Biden was vice president when the massacre occurred on June 17, 2015, less than a month after his son, Joseph "Beau" Biden III, died of brain cancer. Biden went to Charleston more than a week later to embrace the community that was still in mourning.
Nine years later, Biden returns to the hallowed site as a powerful reminder of the consequences of extremism.
Biden's visit aims to present South Carolina voters with a stark choice more three years after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, with Biden positioning himself as a steadfast defender of democracy while Trump faces accusations of leveraging "all of his power to systematically dismantle and destroy our democracy."
Charleston County Democratic Party Chair Sam Skardon told USA Today said the vision would show the clash "between Donald Trump, who is facing criminal charges for violently rejecting the results of a democratic election, and President Biden, who is working to expand voting rights and strengthen our democratic institutions."
South Carolina is also the site of the Democratic National Convention later this summer.
With the 2024 election cycle days away, and Biden's first electoral test in the Feb. 3 Democratic primary in South Carolina, the incumbent was seeking to reestablish himself with Black voters who had seemingly grown apathetic since the 2020 election.
Clyburn, told CNN's State of the Union on Sunday -- after a meeting with the president -- that Biden must re-engage with Black voters as he has demonstrated effectiveness on the economy but also failed to secure congressional protections for voting and civil rights, such as the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.
"We have not been able to break through that MAGA wall in order to get to people exactly what this president has done," Clyburn said.
"It is one thing for people to see you. It is also one thing for people to hear you. But the most effective thing is for people to feel you. That is what is effective," Clyburn said. "That's why he's effective. People feel Joe Biden."
By going to the Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, Biden was making a symbolic move, while delving into a deeply emotional chapter of the nation's collective conscience, while making a heartfelt effort to reconnect with Black support that appears to be dissipating three years into his term.
In recent weeks, Biden has worked to call attention to policies that have benefited the nation's Black citizens as he faced criticism from progressives that he had not fully addressed the issue of reparations since taking office.
In December, he traveled to Milwaukee, Wis., to highlight the growth of Black business ownership under his administration and to call attention to federal investments in Black-owned firms to remove lead pipes.
The president is scheduled to depart Charleston at 4:30 p.m., and fly to Dallas in the evening and visit Concord Church to pay respects to late Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson, who died on New Year's Eve at age 89.
From there, the president will return to Washington aboard Air Force One and arrive back at the White House after midnight.
