President Joe Biden recently denounced former US commander-in-chief Donald Trump, saying that he and his Make America Great Again (MAGA) Republican supporters are out to destroy the nation’s institutions and democracy.
The 80-year-old Biden also referred to the members of Donald Trump’s party in Congress as extremists.
Biden described Donald Trump’s MAGA Republican movement as a threat in an interview that was broadcast on Sunday.
The Democrat told ProPublica: “I think that this is the last gasp or maybe the first big gasp of the MAGA Republicans. And I think Trump has concluded that he has to win.”
In his new attacks, Biden said: “[Trump] will pull out all the stops. I mean, the quotes he uses are just — I never thought I’d hear a president say some of the stuff he says.”
Days earlier, Biden launched attacks on Trump terming him an “extremist” who was posing a grave threat to American democracy and institutions.
Biden regarded Trump as driven by “vengeance and vindictiveness”, calling his hard-right Republican friends posing a threat to the freedom of speech and the supremacy of the law.
“We should all remember: democracies don’t have to die the end of a rifle,” the commander-in-chief had said adding that “they can die when people are silent when they fail to stand up or condemn threats to democracy.”
In his accusations on the 77-year-old, Biden said: “Trump and the MAGA Republicans are determined to destroy American democracy,” rebuking “extremists in Congress who want to burn the place down.”
In his speech in Arizona on Thursday, Biden refrained from addressing the criminal charges brought against the former president, including his part in tampering with the 2020 election results that led to a violent riot that attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.
However, the Democrat was forthright in his speech about the dangers he claimed a second Trump term would pose to the country.
“They’re not hiding their attacks. They’re openly promoting them, attacking the free press as the enemy of the people, attacking the rule of law, fulminating voter suppression.”
Biden attacked hardline Trump-allied Republicans for pushing the US towards a government shutdown this week and criticized Republicans in particular for failing to speak out after Donald Trump recently accused a senior US military officer of treason.
However, Biden saved some of his harshest criticism for Trump himself, addressing him by name instead of referring to the Republican as his “predecessor” or “the last guy” as he usually does.
Donald Trump was criminally charged four times, once for Georgia election interference and three times for paying hush money.
His accusations of rigged elections inciting riots on January 6, 2021, are just a few of the charges against him. Others include keeping sensitive documents after leaving the White House, interfering with elections, and engaging in criminal racketeering to overturn Georgia’s election results.
While responding to the question of Trump’s disqualification, Biden avoided making an opinion noting that “a lot of serious constitutional scholars” disagree on the matter.
He stated: “I worry because I know that if the other team of MAGA Republicans win, they don’t want to pull the rule of law, they want to get rid of the FBI.”
Biden warned that democracy is facing threats in other parts of the world as well and that it would be cataclysmic for the free world if it fails here.