President Joe Biden called for racial justice and economic advancement at the National Action Network’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day breakfast in Washington, D.C.
Alternating between demands for civil rights progress and kitchen-table issues, Biden told the crowd he is determined to help Black Americans fully join in the nation’s prosperity.
“We face another inflection point in our history,” he told the Rev. Al Sharpton’s forum. “It’s a time for choosing. Will we choose democracy over autocracy, love over hate?
“The path is clear — to go there we need to go together,” he added.
He also lashed out at Republicans, who have slammed his economic agenda.
“They’re gonna talk about big-spending Democrats again,” he said. “Guess what? I reduced the deficit last year $350 billion ... But so what? These guys are the fiscally demented, I think. They don’t quite get it.”
Along with voting rights and appointing Black judges, Biden said his administration has succeeded in leading the country and especially Black America out of the economic downturn sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Biden trumpeted his bipartisan infrastructure bill and Inflation Reduction Act as transformative economic boosts for Black colleges and businesses, along with environmental measures aimed at reducing pollution that disproportionately affects people of color.
Black voters overwhelmingly backed his 2020 presidential bid.
“We have to stand together,” Biden said. “You had my back and I’ve had yours.”
Sharpton enthusiastically introduced Biden as a president who fulfilled his promises to the Black community.
“In the last two years Joe Biden and (Vice President) Kamala Harris have literally changed the lives of all our people,” Sharpton said.
King’s eldest son marked the holiday by predicting that the nation is “gonna get there on voting rights.”
Martin Luther King III slammed voter suppression laws that aim to make it harder for Americans to cast ballots.
“It’s going to be quite difficult for any of that to happen with this Republican-led Congress, but we have to keep exerting pressure,” King told CNN. “It may not be this year, but we’re gonna get there.”
Democrats tried to pass sweeping voting reform during Biden’s first two years in office, but the efforts hit a wall in the Senate.
The appearances came a day after Biden became the first sitting president to deliver a Sunday sermon at the Atlanta church where Martin Luther King Jr. once preached.
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