“Democracy is under threat,” Biden said six days before the midterm elections

First modification: 03/11/2022 – 03:07

Before the Democratic National Committee in Washington, DC, the president of the United States, Joe Biden, spoke about the mid-term legislative elections that will be held on November 8 and where Americans will decide who will occupy all of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives and the 35 seats – a third – of the Senate (as well as state governors and other local representatives).

After weeks of reassuring speeches about the economy, Biden said that democracy is “under threat” due to lies inspired by former President Donald Trump, who denies the 2020 presidential elections and that provoke, according to the president, political violence. For Biden, the former president “refuses to accept the will of the people, refuses to accept that he lost.”

To illustrate the tense moment that the North American nation is experiencing regarding the threat of political violence, he referred to the attack on the husband of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, since according to him it was due to Trump’s statements, which has “fueled the dangerous rise” of this scourge “and voter intimidation over the past two years.”

In addition, he added: “The assailant entered the house asking: ‘Where is Nancy? Where is Nancy? Those were the same words used by the mob when they stormed the United States Capitol on January 6,’ Biden exhorted.

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Six days before these decisive elections that put into the deck whether the Democrats will keep their majorities in the Legislative or if the Republicans will take them away, the president stated that currently “there are candidates who present themselves at all levels of the office in United States, for governor, for Congress, for the attorney general, for the secretary of state, who are not committed to accepting the results of the elections they are in.”

According to Biden, this “is the path to chaos in the United States. It is unprecedented. It is illegal. And, it’s un-American.”

Biden targeted Republicans with “ultra MAGA”, short for “Make America Great Again”, the motto that Trump promoted during his campaign and that is strong in some minority redoubts of the Republican Party.

In addition, he said he was concerned about political violence and threats in the electoral context. He mentioned that Republicans are trying to “succeed where they failed in 2020 to suppress voter rights and subvert the electoral system itself.”

He referred to the “alarming increase in the number of people in this country who condone political violence or simply remain silent” and stressed that “silence is complicity.”

The control of Congress, in suspense for the Democrats

Regarding the attack on Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021, Joe Biden asked voters to reject those candidates who have denied the results of the 2020 election, and urged them to “think long and hard about the moment” in which is the country. For him, “in a normal year, we are not usually faced with the question of whether the vote we cast will preserve democracy or put it at risk,” he said. “But this year we are.”

The president is in a campaign against the clock in favor of the Democrats before the elections, since if the Republicans take control of both chambers, his government program would be slowed down. According to pre-election polls, the Democrats may lose control of the House of Representatives, while it is difficult for the Senate to establish who will win the race.

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After 20 minutes of speech, Biden sent an encouraging message of unity, saying: “My countrymen, we will get through this moment. We just have to remember who we are. We are the United States of America. There is nothing beyond our ability if we do it together.” .

Polls question the electoral process

In a Reuters/Ipsos poll, Americans were concerned about voter fraud, even though it is extremely rare in this country. 49% said it is a widespread problem, with 34% Democrats and 69% Republicans holding this opinion.

Some 44% of those surveyed said they are concerned that the US election is rigged, including 28% of Democrats and 62% of Republicans.

Regardless of these perceptions, 67% of those surveyed, both Democrats and Republicans, said they trust their votes will be counted.

Another poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 9% of adults think democracy works “extremely well” or “very well,” while 52% say it doesn’t work well.

With Reuters and AP