Biden, in 1st major speech after Trump shooting, accuses him of ‘lying like hell’

LAS VEGAS — President Joe Biden on Tuesday made his first major speech since the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, lamenting how heated politics have become, but pivoting back to fiery attacks on the former president’s claims and policy proposals — avoiding personal attacks but at one point accusing him of “lying like hell.”

As the the GOP gathered for the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee in battleground Wisconsin, he traveled to Las Vegas to rally Black voters in battleground Nevada — in what was billed as an official event but sounded like a campaign rally.

“I’m truly honored to be here at this tense moment in this country,” he said, addressing the NAACP’s national convention, referring to Saturday’s shooting just three days before.

“It is a tense moment just a few days after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, we’re grateful he was not seriously injured,” Biden said. “We continue to pray for him and his family. It’s time for an important conversation in this country.”

“Our politics has gotten too heated,” he continued. “As I’ve said in the Oval Office on Sunday night, as I’ve made clear throughout my presidency, we all have responsibilities to lower the temperature and condemn violence in any form. You gotta remember, in America we’re not enemies, we’re friends, we’re neighbors.”

But Biden did not refrain from relentlessly criticizing the former president in his 30-minute speech, saying that “just because you must lower the temperature … doesn’t mean we should stop telling the truth of who you are, what you’ve done, what you’ll do.”

Biden used Saturday’s shooting to launch into a forceful condemnation of gun violence in America, nearly yelling when he cited the impact of gun violence on kids.

“You know, the pain, the price of violence. You understand if you’re going to talk about standing against violence, you must stand against all violence,” Biden said, addressing NAACP members, before listing off other notable acts of violence, including the killing of George Floyd, and the events of January 6, 2021.

“More children in America died of gunshot wounds than any other reason. That is stunning and that is sick,” he later almost shouted.

Biden appeared careful to focus on policy differences and Trump’s record — and not calling Trump himself, as he has before, a “threat to democracy.”

“Just think about where the Black community was when I came into office. Think about how far the Black community has come. We still got a long way to go. COVID no longer controls our lives. Our economy has not figuratively, literally, the strongest economy in the world; historic low Black unemployment, record growth of black small business. Let me say this again, because Trump is lying like hell about it,” he said. “Black unemployment hit a record low under Biden-Harris administration.”

“As Harry Truman said, ‘I’ve never deliberately given anyone hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell,'” Biden said. “That’s what I’m gonna do. Well, here’s the truth about why Donald Trump’s presidency was hell for Black Americans.”

The president cited Trump’s efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, his tax cut which benefitted wealthy Americans, and his pandemic policies that Biden said were “especially devastating to Black communities.”

Then, capitalizing on Trump’s comment in last month’s debate in which he referenced “Black jobs,” Biden said, “Folks, I know what a Black job is: it’s the Vice President of the United States! I know what a Black job is: the first Black president in American history, Barack Obama!” as audience members roared in approval.

In a notable comment amid some calls for him to step aside for someone else to lead the ticket, primarily Vice President Kamala Harris, Biden said of her, “And by the way, she’s not only a great vice president, she could be president of the United States.”

At one point, Biden took aim individually at Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, Trump’s newly selected running mate, seeking to tie him, as he has done with Trump, to Project 2025.

“They’re lying about their Project 2025. They want to deny your freedom: the freedom to vote, have your vote counted. They’d impose a nationwide ban on abortion. His new vice president, if you ever had any doubt, man, just take a look at what he’s been saying,” Biden said. “They want to prosecute their political enemies, they want to cut Social Security and Medicare.”

Earlier in his remarks, though it’s become the focus of his campaign’s messaging in recent weeks, Biden flubbed his delivery of his anti-Project 2025 argument multiple times, at one point calling it “this project of 2024” and another “their program on 2025.”

At another point, when announcing his administration’s proposal to place a 5% cap on rent increases, the president seemed to have lost track of the teleprompter’s words, pausing and leaning in before falsely saying the cap would be “no more than 55 dollars.” About two minutes later, Biden correctly said it was 5%.

These flubs come as Biden’s every comment under an intense microscope after last month’s poor debate performance.

Though focus on the president’s age has taken a temporary backseat with the attempted assassination of Trump and the addition of Vance to the Republican ticket, Biden alluded to the difficult two weeks he has endured after his debate performance.

“Harry Truman was a president who was often counted out. He was also known for something else,” Biden said. “The story goes, Truman said, ‘You want a friend in Washington? Get a dog.’ Well, guess what? Last couple weeks – after the last couple weeks, I know what he means,” Biden said.

Biden has seen softening support among Black voters in recent polls, with Democrats fearing their base will sit out the election, but the attendees at Tuesday’s event were largely in his corner, welcoming him with cheers of “Four more years!”

Shavon Arline-Bradley, the president and chief executive of National Council of Negro Women, one of those who spoke ahead of Biden, said Black women were going to stay in engaged.

“In the spirit of Bethune and Height this morning,” she said, referencing civil rights icons Mary McLeod Bethune and Dr. Dorothy Height, “we are here to light under the feet of this country and say, ‘not on our watch.”

“Black women, we’re going to do our part,” Arline-Bradley continued. “Black women, we’re going to do our part to save democracy again. We’re going to have women on the ballot, again. We’re going to organize the voters again.”

Arline-Bradley later adding, “And Black women we will never be silenced ever, ever, ever again.”