Making his second fundraising trip to Chicago in a month, President Joe Biden on Wednesday sought to remind voters of the chaos created by his predecessor and warned that the nation’s biggest threat is Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
“The bad news is, he means what he says. Unless you think I’m kidding, just think back to the 6th of January,” Biden said, referring to the deadly 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
“But look, chaos is nothing new for Trump. His presidency was chaos,” Biden continued during a 16-minute speech before nearly 80 people inside a meeting room at the Palmer House hotel in the Loop. “Trump is trying to make the country forget about the dark and unsettling things that he did when he was president. Well, we’re not going to let him forget.”
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Chicago, where Biden is expected to be formally renominated for president at the Democratic National Convention in August, has become a reliable ATM for Biden’s presidential campaign. Vice President Kamala Harris also is set to speak at a Chicago-area fundraising event on May 16. An estimate of how much money was raised Wednesday was not immediately available. On his March 8 trip, Biden raised an estimated $2.5 million.
During his speech Wednesday, Biden portrayed the U.S. as a nation that had moved significantly ahead from Trump’s White House days when Trump attempted to dismiss the potential severity of the COVID-19 outbreak and he suggested people inject themselves with bleach.
“The bleach, he didn’t inject in his body. He put it in his hair,” Biden joked. “I don’t think anybody wants to go back to that. And I think we’ve just got to remember and remind people what’s going on.”
Biden also lashed out at Trump’s role in urging congressional Republicans to dismiss a Democratic-backed immigration reform plan to keep the potent issue alive for the November election.
“I proposed the most comprehensive immigration reform in decades. Trump says immigrants are poisoning the blood of Americans. Well, I wonder how many of us would be here if that was the case with our forefathers?” the president asked.
“He said the biggest threat, the biggest threat, is these criminals coming across the border. Well, folks, the biggest threat is Trump and what he poses for our democracy,” Biden said.
Outside the Palmer House, a group of pro-Palestinian protesters shut down State Street at Monroe Street, using a bullhorn to assail Biden and U.S. policies supportive of Israel.
The protest, along with road closures in the Loop around the hotel for presidential security purposes, sent downtown rush-hour traffic into gridlock at many intersections.
Chicago police stand in front of the Palmer House as pro-Palestinian protesters rally on State Street while President Joe Biden attends a fundraiser for his reelection campaign at the downtown Chicago hotel on May 8, 2024. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
Biden made no mention of the Israel-Hamas conflict during his brief address. But in speaking to CNN before arriving in Chicago, the president said he’d told Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that U.S. shipments of some heavy weapons would be halted if the Israeli military invaded Rafah in the Gaza Strip, where more than a million Palestinians have taken refuge.
Biden’s fundraising effort in Chicago kicked off three days of presidential travel. Biden also will head out for a series of West Coast campaign events, including fundraising receptions in the San Francisco area on Friday and in Seattle later Friday and on Saturday.
Biden’s Chicago visit followed a trip to Racine County in the critical presidential swing state of Wisconsin, where he touted investment in high-tech manufacturing in a city once seen as stereotypical of a declining rust belt.
At the Gateway Technical College, Biden called Racine a “great comeback story” in hailing Microsoft’s $3.3 billion investment to construct a new artificial intelligence datacenter that company officials said will create 2,300 union construction jobs and eventually lead to 2,000 permanent jobs.
The location of the AI facility also provided Biden a chance to criticize Trump.
Some of the land for the data center is located at the same place where Trump six years ago had lauded the promise of Taiwanese electronics manufacturer Foxconn to invest $10 billion in an LCD screen production facility that would create 13,000 jobs — with $500 million in public money used as an enticement.
Instead, after homes and farms were bulldozed for the production facility, Foxconn abandoned plans for screen manufacturing at the site and few jobs were created.
“He came here with your senator, Ron Johnson, literally holding a golden shovel, promising to build the eighth wonder of the world. You kidding me?” Biden told the crowd. “Look what happened. They dug a hole with those golden shovels, and then they fell into it.”
In contrast, Biden said, “On my watch, we make promises and we keep promises. We leave no one behind.”
Biden’s comments came as new polling showed the president was continuing to have difficulties selling his domestic policy and economic initiatives as achievements to voters.
Though he pushed his theme of “Bidenomics,” voters still remain sensitive to inflationary costs.
“We’re doing what has always worked in this country,” he said, explaining the rationale of “Bidenomics.” “Giving people a fair shot, leaving nobody behind, growing the economy from the middle out and the bottom up, not the top down.”
