Biden strikes economic
populist tone during
campaign rally before
exuberant union
members
President Joe Biden delivered an unapologetically economic populist message Saturday during the first rally of his reelection campaign, telling an exuberant crowd of union members that his policies had created jobs and lifted the middle class. Now, he said, is the time for the wealthy to “pay their fair share” in taxes.
Biden spotlighted the sweeping climate, tax and health care package signed into law last year that cut the cost of prescription drugs and lowered insurance premiums — pocketbook issues that advisers say will be the centerpiece of his argument for a second term.
“I’m looking forward to this campaign,” Biden said to cries of “four more years!” before adding, “We’ve got a record to run on.”
His choice of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania — and a friendly union audience — as his first official campaign stop reflected their crucial role in his reelection effort. The city was the site of his 2020 campaign headquarters and the state was one of a handful that...flipped back to Democrats...
More than 1,000 union workers representing professions from carpenters and airport service workers to entertainers and heavy service equipment engineers — most wearing T-shirts bearing their union’s logos — began chanting “Let’s go, Joe!” and “We want Joe” and blowing whistles hours before the president arrived.
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The event, which organizers said included unions representing 18 million workers nationwide, recalled then-candidate Biden opening his 2020 presidential campaign at a union hall in Pittsburgh.
Several of the nation’s most powerful unions — including the AFL-CIO, American Federation of Teachers and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — officially endorsed Biden’s campaign on Friday. The first-of-its-kind joint endorsement among the unions, and the backdrop of hundreds of workers are part of a meticulously choreographed effort to show the support of labor behind what Biden himself calls the most pro-union president in history.
The union endorsements followed Wednesday’s joint endorsement from major environmental groups, a back-to-back backing by design, according to a campaign official, meant to demonstrate that tackling climate change through green jobs does not threaten workers’ rights.
Biden claimed in his remarks that if Wall Street bankers went on strike, no one would notice. But if unions members walked off the job, “the whole country would come to a grinding halt.”
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“I fear that the Republicans are going to get caught in their cycle that they did last time and people aren’t going to buy it this time, so Joe’s going to sweep right in,” alluding to Trump, the early front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination-Jennifer McKinnon, 53, a grade school librarian and member of the National Education Association.
Ms. McKinnon is correct and I have long yearned for a Trumpie-Joe rematch.
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[Clark Hamilton, a 63-year-old retiree and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers member] said he’s confident that Biden’s record will secure him a second term next year “especially if it’s against Trump.”
Mr. Hamilton is correct. Biden is going to beat Trump like an orange-headed step-child.
The new Silent Majority. This article is like an invigorating aftershave.
