Joe Biden pledged to rebuild the battered U.S. economy and tackle the coronavirus pandemic as he accepted the Democratic Party’s nomination for president on Thursday night, casting himself as a salve to a nation wounded by the policies of President Donald Trump.
In a speech that veered between lofty rhetoric and specific proposals, Biden said the U.S. will overcome what he called a “season of darkness” that has blossomed under Trump. He said there was a battle for the soul of the country, as Americans struggle with COVID-19, a shattered economy, racial justice and climate change.
“I’ll be an ally of the light, not the darkness,” said Biden from Wilmington, Del.
Capping the Democrats’ almost-entirely virtual convention, and coming in the midst of a global pandemic that has claimed more than 173,000 American lives, Biden’s address followed testimonials earlier in the week from party luminaries including former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, former first lady Michelle Obama, and vice-presidential nominee Kamala Harris, who spoke Wednesday night.
With Biden as their nominee, the Democrats put up a united front against Trump, saying the Republican president has bungled the pandemic and treated the White House as a reality show. They also drove home a get-out-the-vote message, as Trump has alleged that more mail-in voting would result in fraud. There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud through mail-in voting.
Trump staged an event Thursday just outside the former vice president’s birthplace in Scranton, Pa. The Republican charged that Biden “is a puppet of the radical left movement” who is a threat to investors DJIA, +0.16% and the economy.
Trump Today: Trump blasts Biden in his Pennsylvania hometown hours before former V.P. accepts Democratic nomination for president.
Biden’s proposals include expanding Obamacare by offering a public-insurance option; increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour; spending $2 trillion over four years on clean-energy projects; and free COVID-19 testing.
Under Trump, Biden said, COVID cases and deaths will “remain far too high.”
In the wake of the killings of George Floyd and other Black Americans, moreover, Biden has vowed investment in Black-owned businesses and said the Federal Reserve must address racial economic gaps as part of its mission.
Also read:Here’s where Joe Biden has moved to the left — and where he hasn’t.
With unemployment above 10% as the U.S. struggles amid the coronavirus pandemic, Biden and Harris have been pushing a message of job creation and have pledged to manage the viral outbreak better than Trump.
Stocks SPX, +0.31% have reclaimed their perches at all-time highs, but other grim statistics give Biden an opening in November, Widener University political scientist J. Wesley Leckrone recently told MarketWatch.
“Now, [Biden] can start reaching out and saying, ‘I know what you’re going through right now, I grew up in that environment, and we’re going to build back,’” said Leckrone. Biden frequently references his middle-class upbringing, and called Harris a “fearless fighter for the little guy” when he announced her as his running mate.
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Trump is trailing Biden in polls of battleground states including Pennsylvania, Florida and Wisconsin. Betting markets are pointing to a Biden victory.
Next week, Republicans will renominate Trump during their own largely virtual convention, and shift the spotlight back to the president. Trump reportedly wants a program heavy with live programming and plans to deliver his address from the White House.
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