US president-elect Joe Biden on Monday pointedly criticized US President Donald Trump for threatening core principles of democracy even as he told Americans that their form of self-government ultimately “prevailed.”
Speaking from his long-time home of Wilmington, Delaware, on the day that electors nationwide cast votes affirming his victory, Biden was blunt in critiquing the damage done by Trump’s allegations that the contest was stolen.
Such arguments have been rejected by judges across the political spectrum, including the justices at the US Supreme Court.
Photo: AFP
Democracy has been “pushed, tested, threatened,” Biden said. However, he said it proved to be “resilient, true, and strong.”
“The flame of democracy was lit in this nation a long time ago,” Biden said. “And we now know that nothing, not even a pandemic or an abuse of power, can extinguish that flame.”
Biden and his team hope that his formal victory in the US Electoral College, combined with his record-setting 81 million vote count, would help the country unify and accept his presidency.
However, the challenge facing Biden was evident, as many congressional Republicans, including some of the party’s top leaders, refused to officially accept Biden’s win.
The president-elect acknowledged an irony in the circumstances, noting that he won with the same number of electoral votes — 306 — as Trump did four years ago. Trump hailed that win as a “landslide.”
“By his own standards, these numbers represent a clear victory then, and I respectfully suggest they do so now,” Biden said.
That Biden had to even give such a speech shortly after electors voted to make him the president shows how extraordinary the post-election period has been.
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