President Biden’s initial plan of attack for his reelection campaign will focus on blaming former President Donald Trump for the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol, linking Mr. Trump with White nationalism and faulting Republicans for the migrant crisis at the southern border, campaign and administration officials said Wednesday.
Mr. Biden will open his campaign in the new year on Saturday with an event near the historic site of Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, where a winter encampment of Revolutionary War patriots in 1777-78 was credited with saving the fledgling American democracy. There, in a key swing state, the president will mark the third anniversary of the attack on the Capitol by Trump supporters who sought to stop the congressional certification of Mr. Biden’s victory.
“On Jan. 6, 2021, we witnessed a very different vision of America — one defined by revenge, retribution, and a rebuke of our very democracy,” said Biden-Harris campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez. “The threat Donald Trump posed in 2020 to American democracy has only grown more dire in the years since. Our message is clear and it is simple: We are running a campaign like the fate of our democracy depends on it. Because it does.”
Mr. Biden will follow up his visit to the suburbs of Philadelphia with a trip on Monday to South Carolina, an early primary state. The president will speak at a historic church in Charleston where a White nationalist gunman killed nine Black churchgoers in 2015.
“Whether it is White supremacists descending on the historic American city of Charlottesville, the assault on our nation’s capitol on Jan. 6 or a White supremacist murdering churchgoers at Mother Emanuel nearly nine years ago, America is worried about the rise in political violence and determined to stand against it,” said Biden-Harris deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks.
Mr. Trump, the front-runner for the GOP nomination, released a strategy memo this week in which his campaign officials said Mr. Biden and Democrats are trying to divert attention from inflation, the border crisis and the president’s low job approval ratings.
“We are focused on the issues that matter to hardworking Americans like securing the Southern Border and stopping the ’Bidenvasion’ so they can feel safe in their neighborhoods, put food on their tables, put gas in their cars, have peace in the world, and put America First,” said Trump campaign officials Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles.
The first election contest will be the GOP Iowa caucuses on Jan. 15. Mr. Trump is the heavy favorite over rivals including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy.
While the Biden campaign is focused on tying Mr. Trump to far-right extremism, the administration on Wednesday sought to turn the tables on Republicans on illegal immigration, which is arguably the president’s biggest weakness.
Ahead of a visit by House Speaker Mike Johnson, Louisiana Republican, to the border, the White House accused GOP lawmakers of dodging the immigration issue they’ve been using as a political cudgel against Mr. Biden.
“Actions speak louder than words. House Republicans’ anti-border security record is defined by attempting to cut Customs and Border Protections personnel, opposing President Biden’s record-breaking border security funding and refusing to take up the President’s supplemental funding request,” said White House spokesperson Andrew Bates.
Mr. Bates blamed House Republicans for blocking the president’s supplemental funding package, which included money for new border agents, asylum officers and immigration judges as well as combating fentanyl trafficking.
A Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll released last month found that just 38% of voters approved of Mr. Biden’s handling of immigration, a drop from 46% in November.
While Mr. Biden is on the defensive about his immigration record, Mr. Trump is also trying to flip the script. He is framing the 91 criminal charges against him as evidence of a political prosecution determined to end his candidacy.
“They are indictments against millions of freedom-loving, hardworking Americans across this country,” Mr. Trump’s campaign said in a statement. “A handful of corrupt political bureaucrats decided to flex their political muscle and dared anyone to challenge them. They have weaponized a revered tenant of our federal system against a political opponent, just as is done in third-world nations.”
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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