Did You Know Im Mixed Like Obama

Watch Obama'due south Full Speech at the Democratic National Convention

The very future of our commonwealth is at stake, former President Barack Obama said Wednesday nighttime, imploring voters to oust President Trump.

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Quondam President Barack Obama delivered biting criticism of President Trump, comparison Mr. Trump'southward use of the White House to a reality show. Credit Credit... Democratic National Convention

Aug. 19, 2020

Onetime President Barack Obama delivered an impassioned speech on Midweek to the Democratic National Convention in support of his party's presidential nominee, Joseph R. Biden Jr., praising him equally a human of feel, graphic symbol, empathy and resilience, and urging the nation to come together to oust President Trump, saying democracy'due south very existence is in jeopardy.

Calling the consequences of Mr. Trump's failures severe — "170,000 Americans expressionless, millions of jobs gone, our worst impulses unleashed, our proud reputation around the earth badly diminished and our democratic institutions threatened like never before" — Mr. Obama issued a phone call to action, imploring Americans to get backside Mr. Biden and his vice-presidential running mate, Senator Kamala Harris of California.

"What we exercise these next 76 days volition repeat through generations to come," Mr. Obama said, urging all Americans to vote.

"Tonight, I am asking you to believe in Joe and Kamala's ability to lead this country out of dark times and build it dorsum meliorate," he said on the convention's 3rd night, likewise calling upon Americans to "encompass your ain responsibleness as citizens — to brand sure that the basic tenets of our republic suffer Considering that's what'due south at stake correct now. Our democracy."

Mr. Obama, adopting a tone of urgency and speaking straight to his swain Americans, delivered his speech from the Museum of the American Revolution in Philadelphia in what the party said was an effort to illustrate the high stakes voters confront in this election.

Repeating a theme from a speech delivered past his wife, Michelle Obama, the former get-go lady, on Monday night, Mr. Obama said that Mr. Trump was simply incapable of beingness president, issuing a stunning rebuke of his successor.

"I did hope, for the sake of our country, that Donald Trump might prove some interest in taking the job seriously," Mr. Obama said. "That he might come to feel the weight of the office. And notice some reverence for the democracy that had been placed in his intendance. But he never did."

"Donald Trump hasn't grown into the job because he can't," he said.

Mr. Obama offered an unflinching criticism of the president, arguing emphatically that Mr. Trump had abused his presidential power. "No one, including the president, is in a higher place the law," Mr. Obama said. "And no public official, including the president, should utilize the office to enrich themselves or their supporters."

Much of Mr. Obama'due south address was devoted to praise for Mr. Biden, with the sometime president offering upwardly his endorsement equally a letter of recommendation for the man he had in one case picked to step in and fill his shoes if the demand arose.

Listen to 'The Daily': Joe Biden's 30-Year Quest

The former vice president twice failed to secure the Democratic nomination. Now he has succeeded, how much will his past mistakes affect his bid for the White House?

transcript

transcript

Listen to 'The Daily': Joe Biden's 30-Yr Quest

Hosted by Michael Barbaro, produced by Andy Mills, Rachel Quester and Robert Jimison and edited by MJ Davis Lin and Lisa Tobin

The former vice president twice failed to secure the Democratic nomination. Now he has succeeded, how much will his past mistakes affect his bid for the White House?

[music]

michael barbaro

From The New York Times, I'chiliad Michael Barbaro. This is "The Daily." Tonight when Joe Biden formally accepts the Democratic Party's nomination for president, it will be the culmination of a 30-year quest and two failed runs for the role. My colleague, Matt Flegenheimer, on a delayed victory that looks nothing similar Biden had planned.

It's Thursday, August 20.

archived recording

[CHEERING] America needs someone who tin can inspire once more in our people faith and trust in our government. America needs someone with a center.

michael barbaro

Matt, accept united states back to when Joe Biden start runs for president. Where does that story start?

matt flegenheimer

That story starts at a railroad train station in Wilmington, Delaware in June of 1987.

archived recording

And nosotros thank you, Delaware, for giving united states that person, the next president of the United States, Joe Biden.

matt flegenheimer

He's coming in the end of the second term for Ronald Reagan.

archived recording (joe biden)

All right, ladies and gentlemen. Give thanks you lot!

matt flegenheimer

He is in his 40s and —

archived recording (joe biden)

I tell you today that America is a nation at risk.

matt flegenheimer

— he is kind of a generational change candidate.

archived recording (joe biden)

The blaring call from my generation is not 'it is our plow,' but rather, 'it is our moment of obligation and opportunity.'

matt flegenheimer

He uses the words my generation quite a bit. This idea that later Reagan, subsequently a lot of stodgy older men —

archived recording (joe biden)

Nosotros literally have a chance to shape the futurity, to put our postage on the face and character of America. This is not merely history. It is our destiny. [APPLAUSE]

matt flegenheimer

That it was time for a kind of breath of fresh air. And he was somebody who was going to bring that.

archived recording (joe biden)

We need a new kind of presidential leadership, a presidential leadership that is prepared to tell the difficult truths and atomic number 82 this state.

matt flegenheimer

There's not a signature proposal he's running on. He's actually non a 12-bespeak program kind of candidate.

michael barbaro

That sounds similar a pretty vague pitch to be making to voters.

matt flegenheimer

It is kind of vague. And he really struggled with articulating a rationale beyond wanting to exist president.

archived recording (joe biden)

Ladies and gentlemen, at that place's much more to say. Merely I don't want to trespass on my time.

matt flegenheimer

It was not always clear exactly why he was running.

archived recording (joe biden)

Government can exercise many things. But in the final analysis, government can deed little more than as a catalyst. We must demand more of ourselves, for naught will suffice short of a wholesale commitment of an entire society.

michael barbaro

And why exercise you think he was running?

matt flegenheimer

I think he wanted to be president. He is somebody who, by his own account, talked about that in grade schoolhouse. He'south somebody was elected to the Senate at 29, took office shortly thereafter when he turned 30. And this is a dream he had chased, in some measure, from the moment that he entered public office. At the same time, he besides looked around at the fields in '88 and was unimpressed. They were sort of known derisively — at the field at that point on the Autonomous side — as the seven dwarfs. Information technology was sort of the put down in the press. And he looked at that group and said, "Why not Joe Biden?"

michael barbaro

And when he enters this race, who is Joe Biden in this moment? What is he actually known for, given his career up to that moment?

matt flegenheimer

So despite having been in the Senate at this point for going on three terms merely nearly, he's really still known nationally best for being a kind of tragic figure. He was elected to the Senate in 1972. The following month, his wife and girl were killed in a motorcar crash. His two sons were injured. And he was immediately sort of identified in the public consciousness every bit a figure of tremendous sympathy and as someone who had been left to mourn in public by dint of his profession.

michael barbaro

So his early career in Congress is very much defined past this personal tragedy, as much equally any legislative accomplishment?

matt flegenheimer

That'due south certainly true.

michael barbaro

And so how does this campaign in '87 — how does it get?

matt flegenheimer

It goes fine for a while. He is somebody who is doing very well in fundraising early on. He was drawing crowds even before he entered the race in some of the early on states he was visiting. And I think a lot of figures within the party saw him as very formidable. And then —

archived recording

At present to the controversy that has suddenly erupted around the Autonomous presidential candidate Joseph Biden.

matt flegenheimer

— he gets himself into trouble.

archived recording

The charge that he has plagiarized parts of his speeches.

matt flegenheimer

On a couple of occasions, he'south defendant of lifting the words of others.

archived recording (joe biden)

And I started thinking every bit I was coming over hither, why is it that Joe Biden is the get-go in his family ever to go to a university? Why is that my married woman, who's sitting out in that location in the audition, is the first in her family unit to e'er go to college?

matt flegenheimer

The most memorable is at a debate in Iowa —

archived recording (joe biden)

Is information technology because our fathers and mothers were not bright? Is it considering I'm the get-go Biden in a thousand generations to get a higher and a graduate degree, that I was smarter than the rest?

matt flegenheimer

In Iowa, he is caught using the words of Neil Kinnock, who is a British politico —

archived recording (neil kinnock)

Why am I the first Kinnock in a thousand generations to be able to get to university? What is Glenys the first woman in her family in a thousand generations to be able to get to university? Was information technology because all our predecessors were thick?

matt flegenheimer

— and passing them off equally his own.

archived recording (joe biden)

Is it because they didn't work hard? My ancestors, who worked in the coal mines in Northeast Pennsylvania so would come up after 12 hours and play football game for 4 hours?

archived recording (neil kinnock)

Was it because they were weak? Those people who had worked eight hours underground and and so come and play football?

matt flegenheimer

He's quoted Kinnock before on the trail and cited him accordingly. In this case, he but says the words as if they are ad-lib Joe Biden words. Does not mention Kinnock, no commendation.

archived recording (joe biden)

No. It'southward not because they weren't as smart. It's non considering information technology didn't work as difficult. It's because they didn't accept a platform upon which to stand.

archived recording (neil kinnock)

Information technology was because there was no platform upon which they could stand. [APPLAUSE]

matt flegenheimer

Then it gets picked up in the press.

archived recording

Biden seemed to be challenge Kinnock's vision and life as his own.

archived recording (joe biden)

I should have said, "to paraphrase Neil Kinnock."

archived recording

The problem here is that Senator Biden told his audience he'd just been thinking virtually these things. And he failed to give any credit at all to his famous British speechwriter.

matt flegenheimer

And then this moment begets other moments, unpleasant moments for Joe Biden.

archived recording 1

CBS News institute a tape of a 2d case.

archived recording ii

Biden had appropriated a famous litany from the belatedly Robert Kennedy about what the gross national production cannot measure.

archived recording (joe biden)

Information technology cannot measure out the health of our children —

archived recording (robert kennedy)

The health of our children —

archived recording (joe biden)

— the quality of their pedagogy —

archived recording (robert kennedy)

— the quality of their teaching —

archived recording (joe biden)

— the joy of their play.

archived recording (robert kennedy)

— or the joy of their play.

matt flegenheimer

There is a story on his record in law school —

archived recording 1

Joseph Biden admitted today that he committed plagiarism when he was in law school. He said it was a mistake, merely that information technology was unintentional.

archived recording 2

He quoted five pages of someone else'south work without proper commendation.

matt flegenheimer

Then —

archived recording (voter)

Question, what law school did you attend? And where did you place in that class?

matt flegenheimer

— a video from the spring circulates of him —

archived recording (voter)

And the other question is, could y'all chop-chop —

archived recording (joe biden)

I think I probably accept a much higher IQ than y'all do, I doubtable.

matt flegenheimer

— essentially telling a voter in New Hampshire who asked about his academic history, "I probably have a much higher I.Q. than you lot practice, I suspect."

archived recording (joe biden)

I went to law school on a total academic scholarship, the only one in my course to have a total academic scholarship.

matt flegenheimer

And he goes on to exaggerate his record in police force school, saying things like, I was the simply 1 in my grade to get a full academic scholarship, and other things that turned out not to be truthful. And that combination of both the exaggeration and the sort of belligerence with a member of the electorate did not sit down well when that clip began circulating in a wider fashion. And this sort of snowballs unto itself.

archived recording (joe biden)

If and when I've ever quoted anyone without saying this is their quote, it's either because, in fact, it'due south been conspicuously known by everyone what information technology is, or I honestly did not know I was quoting somebody else.

matt flegenheimer

He has always been dogged by this idea, and it'south an insecurity he's talked well-nigh a lot himself, that he was not necessarily a policy heavyweight or a bright thinker. He didn't get to an Ivy League school. And there was something of a chip on his shoulder equally a result of this. And he really thinks he'southward been disrespected in the national media, not taken seriously enough. In that location's a cliche on Capitol Hill virtually workhorses and show horses. And the perception among a lot of people watching him is that he's a show horse.

archived recording (joe biden)

I took the cases out of the police review article and the footnotes out of the constabulary review commodity. And I thought what I was doing, honestly, was the right way to do it.

matt flegenheimer

So he holds a kind of stop-the-bleeding press conference at the Capitol, trying to essentially reset his entrada and stabilize himself every bit a candidate.

archived recording (joe biden)

And I footnoted it.

matt flegenheimer

And it does not go well.

archived recording (joe biden)

I was incorrect. But I was non malevolent in any way.

matt flegenheimer

He comes off defensive, defiant.

archived recording (joe biden)

That I did non intentionally move to mislead anybody. I didn't.

matt flegenheimer

And you tin run into him really start to come across his initial case, which was so rooted in his own personal integrity, start to fall away. And when that falls away, there's non a whole lot left. Because in that location was non a actually strong policy undergirding this campaign in the first place.

archived recording

[Printing Conference Churr]

matt flegenheimer

By the fall, there is some other thing happening.

archived recording (ronald reagan)

With great pleasance and deep respect for his extraordinary abilities, I today announce my intention to nominate United States Court of Appeals Judge Robert H. Bork.

matt flegenheimer

Reagan nominates Robert Bork to the Supreme Court. And at that place is immediately an effort on the Democratic side to figure out how they can all-time prevent a deeply conservative judge from reaching the court. And Biden, who is the chairman of the Judiciary Committee in the Senate, is at the captain of that endeavour.

archived recording (joe biden)

Those in favor of the Bork nomination will vote yes. Those opposed will vote no. The clerk will call the roll.

matt flegenheimer

Then his squad gets together.

archived recording (clerk)

Mr. Byrd?

archived recording (robert byrd)

No.

archived recording (clerk)

Mr. Metzenbaum?

archived recording (howard metzenbaum)

No.

matt flegenheimer

And 1 of his pinnacle advisers in the Senate essentially says to him —

archived recording (clerk)

Mr. DeConcini?

archived recording (dennis deconcini)

No.

matt flegenheimer

If we lose the Bork fight at this bespeak —

archived recording (clerk)

Mr. Simon?

archived recording (paul simon)

No.

matt flegenheimer

— it will be because of u.s.. And if we win, it'll be in spite of us.

archived recording (clerk)

Mr. Thurmond?

archived recording (strom thurmond)

Aye.

matt flegenheimer

And that really resonates with him. He sees his twenty-four hours job as so essential, not simply because he ostensibly cares about the constituency he serves, simply because he has been so ridiculed as a figure of less than considerable substance. A major Supreme Court hearing is quite the forum to push back against that idea.

archived recording

Mr. Hatch?

archived recording (orrin hatch)

Yep.

archived recording

Mr. Simpson?

archived recording (alan simpson)

Aye.

matt flegenheimer

Then months before anybody even gets a chance to weigh in at the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, Joe Biden is out.

archived recording

Mr. Grassley?

archived recording (chuck grassley)

Aye.

matt flegenheimer

He makes the decision himself. He's going back to the Senate to finish the Bork fight.

archived recording

Mr. Humphrey?

archived recording (gordon humphrey)

Aye.

archived recording

Mr. Biden?

archived recording (joe biden)

No.

matt flegenheimer

And they win.

archived recording

The Robert Bork nomination ended today. The Senate voted by an overwhelming 58 to 42 margin to refuse —

matt flegenheimer

Bork is not confirmed. And Biden has a lot to practice with that. And information technology was a major victory for him.

michael barbaro

And then in order to protect his Senate career, he feels similar he needs to end his bid for president.

matt flegenheimer

He feels like he needs to terminate his bid for president. And at that bespeak, it is not at all articulate that his bid for president would accept gone particularly well, anyway.

archived recording (joe biden)

Mr. President, I'd like to make a few points here if I may.

matt flegenheimer

He goes back to the Senate and really resolves to kind of put his caput downwards and do the work of a senator, and aspires to this sort of legacy of some of the lions of the Senate that he has gotten to know — swain Democrats, like a Ted Kennedy, and too Republicans who he'd really grown close to over the years.

archived recording (joe biden)

So allow me tell yous, if your moral center is oil, I understand you. If your moral middle is humanity, at that place is no comparison the restoration of Kuwait with catastrophe of genocide in Bosnia.

matt flegenheimer

He is really pushing this kind of muscular foreign policy idea that America should exist a force for adept in the globe.

archived recording (joe biden)

And what is the message we send to the earth if nosotros stand up by and we say, we'll allow it go along to happen here in this place, but it is non in our interest?

matt flegenheimer

He is pushing legislation around violence against women, pushing the crime pecker in the mid-'90s under President Clinton.

archived recording (joe biden)

I of the things I desire to practise in improver to ending the law-breaking is terminate the political carnage that goes on when we talk well-nigh criminal offence.

matt flegenheimer

He is seen equally a especially capable bipartisan figure.

archived recording (joe biden)

Offense is not Democrat or Republican.

matt flegenheimer

He talks almost never questioning anybody's motive — maybe their politics, never their motive. And he is seen as kind of an honest banker amidst Republicans, certainly in this period.

archived recording (joe biden)

And I recall there'south a consensus among Republicans in that. Erstwhile spinous wire Republican conservatives [INAUDIBLE] desire to hang them high, even those folks are saying, hey, we've got to deal with the root cause of this.

matt flegenheimer

Even if it earns him the disdain sometimes from the more liberal groups.

archived recording (joe biden)

And liberal Democrats who used to say, "Let'due south wait at the sociological underpinnings of why this occurred and we take to" — they're now saying, hey, expect, we've got to take back the streets. We'll make that fight later on.

matt flegenheimer

Simply he really makes a particularly concerted effort in these years when he is non running for president to bring the kind of heft to the day job that voters didn't necessarily see in 1988.

michael barbaro

And then when does Biden determine in the midst of this pretty successful engagement in the Senate that he'southward going to try to seek the presidency over again?

matt flegenheimer

It's something he never lets go of fully. So he thinks about it in 2004, every bit George Westward. Bush is seeking re-election. Decides against information technology in the stop. But '08 is the fourth dimension when he decides —

archived recording (joe biden)

Friends, today I filed the necessary papers to become candidate for President of the Us.

matt flegenheimer

— he's ready for the 2nd fourth dimension.

archived recording (joe biden)

And along with my wife Jill and my children Beau, Hunter and Ashley, we really expect forwards to beingness out in that location on the campaign trail with yous and getting a chance to encounter you.

matt flegenheimer

And he'south running as a very different candidate, patently. He's been in the Senate for more than xxx years. It's his sixth term. And he brings with that a set of experiences he didn't have in 1988.

archived recording (joe biden)

I've spent the terminal four years traveling back and along to Iraq, meeting with our soldiers, our generals and our diplomats, and trying my level best to convince the president to modify grade.

matt flegenheimer

This is a moment of unpopular wars going on in the land. And he is somebody, according to his pitch, who really understands those challenges because of the work that he's washed in the Senate since his last campaign.

archived recording (joe biden)

The next president of the United States is going to have to exist prepared to immediately footstep in and act without hesitation to end our involvement in Iraq without further destabilizing the Heart East and the rest of the world.

matt flegenheimer

But equally information technology turns out, that kind of feel did non necessarily resonate widely with voters for a whole host of reasons.

archived recording

[CHANTING] Obama! Obama! Obama! Obama!

matt flegenheimer

For one —

archived recording

Obama! Obama!

matt flegenheimer

— he is a figure who is running upwards confronting a historic moment —

archived recording (barack obama)

Thank you!

matt flegenheimer

— in this Autonomous principal.

archived recording (barack obama)

Generations of Americans accept responded with a simple creed —

matt flegenheimer

Barack Obama is running.

archived recording (barack obama)

— that sums up the spirit of a people. Yes, we tin. [Cheering] Yes, nosotros can.

matt flegenheimer

Hillary Clinton is running.

archived recording (hillary clinton)

The question isn't whether we can continue America's hope, information technology's whether we volition go on America'southward promise. [CHEERING]

matt flegenheimer

And despite the relative inexperience in the Senate as his colleagues, the non-celebrated nature of the Biden campaign every bit a white man in his 60s really feels out of step with the times when ready against these dynamic and compelling and particularly history-making candidates against him. At the same time, we meet flashes of the '88 campaign Biden come to the fore very early in this race.

archived recording (joe biden)

Nosotros've got the first sort of mainstream African-American —

archived recording

Yeah.

archived recording (joe biden)

— who is articulate and brilliant and clean and a dainty looking guy. I mean, that's a storybook, homo.

archived recording

Aye.

matt flegenheimer

He also just had a lot of these moments —

archived recording (joe biden)

I spent concluding summer going through the Black sections of my boondocks holding rallies in parks, trying to get Black men to understand information technology is not unmanly to wear a condom, getting women to empathize they can say no, getting people in the position where testing matters.

matt flegenheimer

— these moments of sounding out of touch in kind of a blench-worthy way. Sort of an uncle at a family gathering maxim something that he probably shouldn't.

archived recording (joe biden)

I got tested for AIDS. I know Barack got tested for AIDS. There's no shame in being tested for AIDS. Information technology'due south an important matter. Because the fact of the matter is, in the customs, in the communities engaged in denial —

matt flegenheimer

And on the policy side, quite frankly on the most of import foreign policy issue of the twenty-four hour period, despite his experience in the Senate that he touted, he'due south on the opposite side of Barack Obama. He voted for the Iraq war. Obama did not. One of the points that Barack Obama made throughout is: I may not have the experience on paper, but I exercise have the wisdom to avoid a corrigendum such equally that.

michael barbaro

Hm. So at but the moment when Biden thought that he had proven he was the workhorse and the steady manus and the experienced kind of grey beard of the Senate, that turned out to be the incorrect kind of set of experiences for the Democratic electorate.

matt flegenheimer

It just did not fit the moment. And in that location was really never a moment in that campaign when he felt like a peculiarly serious threat to accept the nomination. The voters of Iowa return their verdict. And he drops out nigh immediately thereafter. Merely unlike '88, he really doesn't embarrass himself either, in the end. He is seen as a sort of affable, knowledgeable peer amongst his rivals. Only he does have to get out the race.

michael barbaro

So here we take some other failed presidential bid. And for the second time, Biden doesn't really get all that far in these Democratic primaries.

matt flegenheimer

No. Two campaigns, zero states won. But what he does get out of this race is —

archived recording (barack obama)

For months I've searched for a leader to terminate this journey aslope me.

matt flegenheimer

— really earning the respect of the eventual nominee, Barack Obama.

archived recording (barack obama)

Today I have come back to Springfield to tell you that I've found that leader. [Cheering]

matt flegenheimer

So when the time comes to pick a running mate —

archived recording (barack obama)

A human with a distinguished record, a man with primal decency. And that man is Joe Biden. [CHEERING]

matt flegenheimer

— Barack Obama chooses Joe Biden.

Biden at this indicate is not seen as particularly likely to seek the presidency again. He's evidently in his 60s. He's run twice and failed. Simply we now know at that place's a chat that the two of them have as he's offer Biden the running mate slot. And Obama says to him, this is in Biden's telling, I hope you lot see this as the capstone to your career. And Biden says back to him, and non the tombstone.

michael barbaro

Mm.

matt flegenheimer

Only that is set aside for the moment. He goes off into the Obama campaign. And of course, Obama and Biden win that election.

archived recording (barack obama)

I desire to give thanks my partner in this journey, a man who campaigned from his center and spoke for the men and women he grew up with on the streets of Scranton, the vice president-elect of the Usa, Joe Biden. [Cheering]

michael barbaro

We'll exist right back.

So just as after 1988, when Biden threw himself into the part of existence a senator, later he loses that '08 race, he really pours himself into the vice presidency in this example.

matt flegenheimer

Absolutely. He sees himself equally the sort of ultimate lieutenant for the first Black president and takes very seriously the thought that they are full partners. He wants to exist the last person who Obama talks to before making a major decision. He wants to be in the room where those tough calls are happening. And I do think in that location is a parallel to that period in his Senate life between these presidential runs. He definitely both absorbs this thought that he should be doing the chore he has and not the job that he might aspire to and seems to believe it. And at that place is certainly a belief among those in the Obama White House that he is not necessarily giving upwardly on those ambitions down the line. Just he is not seen as somebody positioning himself for a run either.

michael barbaro

And is that actually the case, Matt? Considering my sense is that past the time Obama is fix to leave office, that ember that is Joe Biden's perpetual desire to seek the presidency is glowing pretty brightly.

matt flegenheimer

It is. And it probably never went out. You lot don't think well-nigh such things in course school and relinquish them in your 70s.

michael barbaro

Mhm.

matt flegenheimer

Just a couple of things happened tardily in Obama'southward second term. And one of them is political. Hillary Clinton's running for president again. She is effectively clearing the field, it seems. A lot of the Obama performance is already lining up behind her. Barack Obama makes clear that he sees her every bit a pretty suitable heir, potentially. And then tragically, there is the death of Beau Biden, Joe's eldest son, his political heir to the would exist Biden dynasty in Delaware. He was the land attorney general. And information technology was wrenching. This was someone who had already been left to grieve so publicly with such raw emotion early on in his Senate life. And for the second fourth dimension, he is burial a child. And then this was just a peculiarly searing moment for all those who know and beloved Joe Biden. And through some combination of the rawness of that mourning and how far downward the route the Clinton campaign had already gotten, he opts not to run.

archived recording (joe biden)

Proficient forenoon, folks. Please, please, sit down.

matt flegenheimer

He stands in the Rose Garden beside President Obama. And there's a moment at the outset of that press briefing that he says —

archived recording (joe biden)

Mr. President, give thanks yous for lending me the Rose Garden for a minute.

archived recording (barack obama)

It's a pretty nice place.

matt flegenheimer

And at that place is this sense watching that, that information technology was not a place that Joe Biden would take to himself downward the line, that this was probably his concluding window to run.

archived recording (joe biden)

As my family unit and I have worked through the grieving process, I've said all along what I've said time and again to others, that information technology may very well be that that procedure, past the fourth dimension we go through it, closes the window on mounting a realistic campaign for president. That information technology might shut. I've ended information technology has closed.

matt flegenheimer

It was a poignant reminder of all that he had been through prior, and how he had come to be seen equally this kind of avatar of trauma and resilience and how cardinal that was to his public arc throughout his career. And to have this bookend this fourth dimension equally vice president was something that, to Democrats and Republicans, only felt unfair.

michael barbaro

And I remember, Matt, thinking after watching that news conference that this was his final chance to run for president. I think a lot of people thought that. But it turned out that his presidential aspirations did not end in the Rose Garden that twenty-four hours. He ran again in 2020. And afterward a roller coaster campaign in which he was upwardly and he was down and for a moment it looked like he was most written off, he prevails. And just a couple of nights ago, he is formally designated the Democratic Party'due south nominee for president. Then I'm curious, in your mind, what he had going for him in 2020 that he didn't have in those previous ii runs.

matt flegenheimer

Well, in some ways it's a culmination of those runs and all that he had experienced in the time since. He is fusing the kind of personal integrity argument from his '88 campaign — his ain graphic symbol, his own decency — and the experience case he's making in '08, that he is somebody who has been there, has seen it and knows what to do.

michael barbaro

Mhm.

matt flegenheimer

And information technology turns out that that combination becomes pretty compelling in 2020. He is somebody who, through the context of this moment, constitute a rationale. His directorate would say he met the moment. In some ways, the moment dictated it. He ran a campaign in the chief premised not especially on policy or ideology, but on the idea that the country is better than this and that this president has to be defeated.

archived recording (joe biden)

My swain Americans, at that place are moments in our history so grim, and so heartrending that they're forever fixed in each of our hearts, shared grief.

matt flegenheimer

And his campaign argument, in some ways, hinges almost exclusively on this idea that he is a figure of unique perspective.

archived recording (joe biden)

Today is one of those moments. 100,000 lives accept now been lost to this virus.

matt flegenheimer

In this moment of a pandemic, of a reckoning over racial justice, sort of overlapping crises and traumas —

archived recording (joe biden)

I think I know what you're feeling. Yous feel like you're existence sucked into a blackness pigsty in the middle of your breast. Information technology's suffocating.

matt flegenheimer

He is holding himself out equally somebody who knows how to overcome such things, because he has.

archived recording (joe biden)

This nation grieves with y'all. Take some solace from the fact we all grieve with you lot.

matt flegenheimer

It's not as if his biography wasn't compelling in past races. But it's and then much more than resonant in a moment of collective grief in the country and of such tremendous trauma and upheaval in people's daily lives. But at the aforementioned time —

archived recording (joe biden)

If you have a problem figuring out whether you're for me or Trump, and so you ain't Black.

matt flegenheimer

— he is still the Joe Biden that audiences have seen and occasionally chafed at seeing over the years. He is decumbent to gaffes. He had a handful of interactions with voters on the trail during the primary —

archived recording (joe biden)

You're a damn liar, homo. That's not true. And no one has ever said that. No one has heard that —

matt flegenheimer

— that I think his campaign instantly regretted. Sort of confrontational, evocative of that 'I have a higher I.Q. than you practise' moment from '88.

archived recording (joe biden)

Yous said I set up my son to work in an oil company. Isn't that what you said? Get your words straight, Jack.

matt flegenheimer

He's liable to get carried away in front of a crowd, to exaggerate, to misstate something on the argue stage. In that location is no question that those weaknesses persist.

archived recording (joe biden)

And I can get things done. That's why I'm running. And you want to check my shape on let'due south do push ups together, man. Let'southward run. Let'southward do whatever y'all want to exercise.

matt flegenheimer

Then in his first run in '88, he talked about how he saw presidential history in cycles. Yous had these kind of bursts of progress and upheaval, followed past these moments of correction where voters wanted to choose a candidate who could allow the country take hold of its jiff. And the implication so was that he was that candidate, that he was the generational modify, the outburst of progress. And the implication at present is that he is the figure who can permit America catch its breath. And there is such a conspicuous passage of time in that. He is not running on generational change as a 77-year-old man —

michael barbaro

Right.

matt flegenheimer

— in the way that he was 32 years ago. And that passage of fourth dimension is evident. You can hear it in his speeches. Y'all can see information technology in his public appearances. He has been through a lot. He has washed a lot. He has earned that agedness at this stage of his career.

michael barbaro

Matt, I wonder how it volition feel for Joe Biden tonight, afterward all these failed attempts, after all his personal tragedy, to finally have this moment arrive some xxx years after he showtime tries for it. And I'k sure, 30 years of thinking most trying for it again. He will walk out, I approximate, to a podium. This is virtual. It will exist weird. And he volition accept, at last, the Democratic party's nomination for president. How is that going to experience for him?

matt flegenheimer

I recall like so much in his political career, it'll be bloodshot. I mean, retrieve about the scene. He will non be in an arena in Milwaukee. He will be at a remote location in Wilmington. He will not accept a crowd of people chanting his name. No balloons, no "We love Joe." And I think that reflects the moment but is besides such a spectacular come down from the vision of this that he might have had. He's been thinking about the presidency for decade later decade.

archived recording (joe biden)

Today, I announce my candidacy for president of the Us. [Auspicious]

matt flegenheimer

And so much of it won't expect like he expected it to in this moment of triumph.

archived recording (joe biden)

God bless you and thank you.

matt flegenheimer

Both superficially, because of the convention set upwards, and substantially, most powerfully for him because Beau Biden won't exist in that location. In every version of this spoken language that he'southward imagined in his life up until Boyfriend'south death, I'k certain Beau Biden in the wings of the arena and helping him prepare the oral communication is what he had in mind. And if at that place's any throughline to his public life, it'due south this commingling of tragedy and triumph. And in some means, it's a fitting coda to take him accepting the nomination in a way then radically different from what he had hoped, and and so colored past the national grief and gloom of this moment and of the land that he hopes to lead.

michael barbaro

Matt, thank you very much. We appreciate information technology.

matt flegenheimer

Thanks so much for having me.

michael barbaro

We'll be right dorsum.

Hither'south what else you need to know today.

archived recording (hillary clinton)

The morning time after the last election, I said, we owe Donald Trump an open mind and the run a risk to pb. I meant it. Every president deserves that.

michael barbaro

On the third dark of the Democratic National Convention, the last Democratic nominee for president, Hillary Clinton, implored Americans to replace the human who defeated her in 2016 by electing Joe Biden.

archived recording (barack obama)

I wish Donald Trump knew how to be a president because America needs a president correct now.

michael barbaro

Subsequently in the night, President Obama, standing before an image of the U.s. Constitution, offered himself equally a character witness for his onetime vice president.

archived recording (barack obama)

12 years ago, when I began my search for a vice president, I didn't know I'd end upwardly finding a brother. Joe and I come up from different places, different generations. Only what I quickly came to adore about Joe Biden is his resilience, built-in of too much struggle, his empathy, born of also much grief.

michael barbaro

And in the nighttime'southward keynote speech, Senator Kamala Harris accepted the party's nomination for vice president, calling on the country to face up structural racism and acknowledging that the challenges facing her and Biden are enormous.

archived recording (kamala harris)

And then brand no mistake, the road alee is non easy. We may stumble. Nosotros may fall short. Just I pledge to y'all that we will human action boldly and bargain with our challenges honestly. Nosotros volition speak truths. And we volition human action with the aforementioned faith in you that we inquire yous to identify in u.s.a..

michael barbaro

Biden is scheduled to deliver his acceptance speech later tonight.

That's it for "The Daily." I'm Michael Barbaro. Run across y'all tomorrow.

"Twelve years ago, when I began my search for a vice president, I didn't know I'd end up finding a brother," Mr. Obama said, recalling that "Joe and I came from different places and different generations."

But Mr. Obama said that he had chop-chop come up to adore Mr. Biden. "Joe's a human who learned early to care for every person he meets with respect and dignity, living by the words his parents taught him: 'No one'due south ameliorate than you lot, but you lot're better than nobody.'"

Over eight years, Mr. Obama said, "Joe was the final one in the room whenever I faced a big decision."

"He fabricated me a better president," he added. "He's got the character and the experience to make us a better country."

In Ms. Harris, Mr. Obama said, Mr. Biden had "chosen an ideal partner who is more than than prepared for the job, someone who knows what it's like to overcome barriers and who'southward made a career fighting to aid others live out their ain American dream."

Hither is a transcript of Mr. Obama'due south remarks:

Barack Obama: Practiced evening, everybody. Equally you've seen past now, this isn't a normal convention. It's not a normal time. Then tonight, I want to talk as plainly as I can about the stakes in this election. Because what we practice these next 76 days will echo through generations to come.

I'1000 in Philadelphia, where our Constitution was drafted and signed. It wasn't a perfect document. It allowed for the inhumanity of slavery and failed to guarantee women — and even men who didn't own belongings — the right to participate in the political process. But embedded in this document was a North Star that would guide hereafter generations; a system of representative government — a democracy — through which nosotros could improve realize our highest ideals. Through civil war and bitter struggles, we improved this Constitution to include the voices of those who'd once been left out. And gradually, we made this land more simply, more equal and more gratuitous.

The one Constitutional office elected by all of the people is the presidency. And then at minimum, nosotros should wait a president to feel a sense of responsibleness for the safety and welfare of all 330 1000000 of u.s. — regardless of what we look similar, how nosotros worship, who we honey, how much money we have — or who we voted for.

Simply nosotros should also expect a president to exist the custodian of this commonwealth. Nosotros should expect that regardless of ego, ambition or political beliefs, the president will preserve, protect and defend the freedoms and ethics that so many Americans marched for and went to jail for; fought for and died for.

I have saturday in the Oval Function with both of the men who are running for president. I never expected that my successor would encompass my vision or continue my policies. I did promise, for the sake of our country, that Donald Trump might testify some interest in taking the job seriously, that he might come to feel the weight of the role and discover some reverence for the republic that had been placed in his care.

But he never did. For close to four years now, he's shown no interest in putting in the work; no interest in finding common ground; no interest in using the awesome power of his part to help anyone but himself and his friends; no interest in treating the presidency as anything but 1 more reality show that he tin can employ to get the attending he craves.

Donald Trump hasn't grown into the job considering he can't. And the consequences of that failure are severe: 170,000 Americans dead, millions of jobs gone while those at the acme take in more than than ever. Our worst impulses unleashed, our proud reputation around the earth badly diminished and our democratic institutions threatened like never earlier.

Now, I know that in times as polarized equally these, most of yous have already made up your mind. But perhaps you're still not sure which candidate you'll vote for — or whether you'll vote at all. Maybe you're tired of the management we're headed, but y'all can't see a better path notwithstanding, or you only don't know plenty about the person who wants to lead us there.

So let me tell you most my friend Joe Biden.

Twelve years ago, when I began my search for a vice president, I didn't know I'd end up finding a brother. Joe and I came from different places and different generations. Simply what I rapidly came to admire about him is his resilience, born of too much struggle; his empathy, born of too much grief. Joe'due south a homo who learned — early — to treat every person he meets with respect and dignity, living past the words his parents taught him: "No one'south better than you, Joe, but you lot're meliorate than nobody."

That empathy, that decency, the belief that everybody counts — that'due south who Joe is.

When he talks with someone who'due south lost her job, Joe remembers the night his begetter saturday him downwards to say that he'd lost his.

When Joe listens to a parent who's trying to hold it all together right now, he does it as the single dad who took the railroad train dorsum to Wilmington each and every nighttime so he could tuck his kids into bed.

When he meets with military families who've lost their hero, he does it as a kindred spirit; the parent of an American soldier; somebody whose faith has endured the hardest loss there is.

For 8 years, Joe was the concluding one in the room whenever I faced a large decision. He fabricated me a amend president — and he'due south got the character and the experience to make usa a better country.

And in my friend Kamala Harris, he's chosen an platonic partner who'south more than prepared for the job; someone who knows what it's like to overcome barriers and who's made a career fighting to aid others live out their own American dream.

Forth with the experience needed to get things done, Joe and Kamala accept concrete policies that will plough their vision of a ameliorate, fairer, stronger land into reality.

They'll get this pandemic under control, similar Joe did when he helped me manage H1N1 and prevent an Ebola outbreak from reaching our shores.

They'll expand health care to more Americans, like Joe and I did 10 years agone when he helped craft the Affordable Intendance Human activity and smash down the votes to arrive the law.

They'll rescue the economy, like Joe helped me do after the Neat Recession. I asked him to manage the Recovery Deed, which bound-started the longest stretch of chore growth in history. And he sees this moment now not equally a risk to become back to where we were, just to make long-overdue changes and then that our economy actually makes life a little easier for everybody — whether it's the waitress trying to heighten a kid on her ain, or the shift worker ever on the edge of getting laid off or the student figuring out how to pay for next semester'southward classes.

Joe and Kamala volition restore our standing in the world — and equally we've learned from this pandemic, that matters. Joe knows the globe, and the globe knows him. He knows that our truthful strength comes from setting an example the globe wants to follow. A nation that stands with democracy, not dictators. A nation that can inspire and mobilize others to overcome threats similar climate change, terrorism, poverty and disease.

But more than than annihilation, what I know about Joe and Kamala is that they actually care about every American. And they care deeply about this commonwealth.

They believe that in a democracy, the correct to vote is sacred, and nosotros should be making it easier for people to cast their ballot, not harder.

They believe that no 1 — including the president — is above the police force, and that no public official — including the president — should use their office to enrich themselves or their supporters.

They understand that in this democracy, the commander in primary doesn't use the men and women of our military, who are willing to risk everything to protect our nation, as political props to deploy against peaceful protesters on our ain soil. They empathize that political opponents aren't "united nations-American" just considering they disagree with you; that a free press isn't the "enemy" but the style we hold officials accountable; that our ability to work together to solve large problems like a pandemic depends on a fidelity to facts and science and logic and not merely making stuff up.

None of this should be controversial. These shouldn't be Republican principles or Democratic principles. They're American principles. But at this moment, this president and those who enable him, have shown they don't believe in these things.

Tonight, I am asking you to believe in Joe and Kamala's ability to lead this country out of these dark times and build information technology dorsum improve. Only here'southward the thing: no unmarried American can set up this country alone. Not even a president. Republic was never meant to be transactional — you give me your vote; I make everything better. Information technology requires an agile and informed citizenry. So I am also asking you to believe in your own ability — to encompass your ain responsibility equally citizens — to brand certain that the bones tenets of our republic endure.

Because that'southward what's at stake right now. Our democracy.

Wait, I sympathize why many Americans are down on government. The way the rules have been set up and driveling in Congress brand it easy for special interests to finish progress. Believe me, I know. I understand why a white factory worker who's seen his wages cut or his job shipped overseas might experience like the authorities no longer looks out for him, and why a Blackness mother might experience similar it never looked out for her at all. I empathize why a new immigrant might look around this country and wonder whether in that location's still a place for him here; why a young person might look at politics correct now, the circus of it all, the meanness and the lies and crazy conspiracy theories and retrieve, What'south the point?

Well, here's the bespeak: this president and those in ability — those who benefit from keeping things the way they are — they are counting on your cynicism. They know they can't win y'all over with their policies. Then they're hoping to make it every bit hard as possible for yous to vote, and to convince you lot that your vote doesn't matter. That's how they win. That's how they get to keep making decisions that affect your life, and the lives of the people you love. That's how the economic system will go along getting skewed to the wealthy and well-connected, how our health systems volition let more people fall through the cracks. That'due south how a commonwealth withers, until it'south no commonwealth at all.

We tin can't let that happen. Practice not allow them take away your power. Don't let them take away your democracy. Make a program right now for how you're going to get involved and vote. Do it as early on as y'all tin can and tell your family and friends how they can vote as well. Exercise what Americans have done for over two centuries when faced with even tougher times than this — all those repose heroes who constitute the backbone to go along marching, keep pushing in the face of hardship and injustice.

Concluding month, we lost a behemothic of American democracy in John Lewis. Some years ago, I sabbatum down with John and the few remaining leaders of the early civil rights move. Ane of them told me he never imagined he'd walk into the White House and see a president who looked like his grandson. Then he told me that he'd looked it upwards, and it turned out that on the very mean solar day that I was born, he was marching into a prison cell, trying to end Jim Crow segregation in the South.

What nosotros do echoes through the generations.

Whatever our backgrounds, we're all the children of Americans who fought the good fight. Great-grandparents working in firetraps and sweatshops without rights or representation. Farmers losing their dreams to dust. Irish and Italians and Asians and Latinos told to get back where they came from. Jews and Catholics, Muslims and Sikhs, fabricated to feel doubtable for the way they worshiped. Black Americans chained and whipped and hanged. Spit on for trying to sit down at tiffin counters. Beaten for trying to vote.

If anyone had a right to believe that this democracy did non work, and could not work, it was those Americans. Our ancestors. They were on the receiving finish of a democracy that had fallen brusk all their lives. They knew how far the daily reality of America strayed from the myth. And yet, instead of giving up, they joined together and said somehow, some style, we are going to brand this work. We are going to bring those words, in our founding documents, to life.

I've seen that same spirit ascension these by few years. Folks of every historic period and groundwork who packed city centers and airports and rural roads so that families wouldn't exist separated. So that another classroom wouldn't become shot upward. So that our kids won't grow up on an uninhabitable planet. Americans of all races joining together to declare, in the confront of injustice and brutality at the hands of the state, that Blackness lives thing, no more than, but no less, and then that no kid in this country feels the continuing sting of racism.

To the young people who led u.s.a. this summer, telling us we need to be better — in so many ways, y'all are this land'southward dreams fulfilled. Earlier generations had to be persuaded that everyone has equal worth. For you, information technology's a given — a conviction. And what I want you to know is that for all its messiness and frustrations, your organization of self-regime can be harnessed to assist you realize those convictions.

Yous can give our commonwealth new meaning. You can take information technology to a better place. Y'all're the missing ingredient — the ones who will decide whether or not America becomes the country that fully lives up to its creed.

That work will continue long after this ballot. Just any adventure of success depends entirely on the outcome of this ballot. This administration has shown it will tear our democracy downward if that'southward what information technology takes to win. So we have to get decorated edifice it upwardly — by pouring all our effort into these 76 days, and by voting like never earlier — for Joe and Kamala, and candidates up and down the ticket, then that we leave no doubt about what this country we dear stands for — today and for all our days to come up.

Stay safe. God anoint.

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Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/19/us/politics/obama-speech.html

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