In last S.C. push, Biden says he will ‘restore the soul of the nation’
SPARTANBURG, S.C. — Twelve hours before South Carolina voters head to the polls, former Vice President Joe Biden on Friday sought a home court advantage in a college gym before a cheering crowd.
“You hold in your hands the future of the Democratic Party,” Mr. Biden said, pointing out that South Carolina helped propel former President Barack Obama to the presidency in the 2008 primary election.
“If you send me out of here with a victory that’s significant, I think that I’m gonna be the next nominee,” said Mr. Biden, who Mr. Obama selected as vice president that year.
The event at Wofford College’s basketball arena at times resembled a pep rally — staffers tossed Biden Tshirts into the bleachers and played a hype video on the Jumbotron before the candidate’s entrance onto the court.
But Mr. Biden, over nearly two hours, presented his candidacy in stark terms: He is running, he said, to “restore the soul of the nation.”
If President Donald Trump is voted out of office after four years, his presidency will be viewed as an “aberration” in history, Mr. Biden told the crowd. “But if it’s eight years of Donald Trump, there will be a fundamental change in the nature of who we are as a country.”
“And I don’t think that’s an exaggeration,” he said. “We can’t let it happen.”
Mr. Biden, who has been leading in South Carolina by double digits in recent polls, was among the Democratic presidential hopefuls in a crowded field who raced across the Palmetto State — the last full day of campaigning before the “First in the South” primary Saturday. Mr. Biden has said he is staking his primary bid on winning the state.
A Clemson University poll published Wednesday estimated Mr. Biden led the crowded Democratic field with 35% of voters’ support.
Businessman Tom Steyer polled in second place at 17%, and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders sat in third place at 15%. The Democratic primary awards delegates to candidates who garner at least 15% of the vote in a state.
Earlier that day, Mr. Sanders rallied in the state capital of Columbia speaking to a couple of thousand people in a blustery city park. He comes into South Carolina with the most delegates after Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada.
“We are not just a campaign,” Mr. Sanders said. “We’re putting together an unprecedented multiracial, multigenerational movement of millions of working people who are fighting for justice.”
Mr. Sanders was introduced by his prominent supporters and longtime collaborators: former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner, actor Danny Glover, and rapper and activist Killer Mike.
Killer Mike, who is outspoken on issues of police brutality and economic inequality, endorsed Mr. Sanders in 2015.
“If you’re going to claim to be a progressive party — and this is talking to the Democratic Party — you have to actually progress,” he said.
At his rally, Mr. Biden said he hoped his deep experience as vice president and a foreign policy expert has earned their vote.
He criticized Mr. Trump on foreign policy, including the breakdown in nuclear talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and allowing Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to attack Kurdish forces in Syria allied with the United States.
Mr. Biden said Russia has interfered with U.S. elections “in violation of our sovereignty, and [the president] has done nothing about it. Putin knows who I am, and I know who Putin is, and he doesn’t want me to be president.”
He described white nationalists in vivid detail, emboldened by Mr. Trump’s remark that there were fine people on “both sides” after the 2017 rally in Charlottesville, Va.
“Close your eyes,” Mr. Biden said, “and picture those people coming out of the woods and the fields carrying torches, their veins bulging, shouting anti-Semitic slogans.”
Speaking to the outbreak of the coronavirus, Mr. Biden recalled how he worked with Mr. Obama to reassure the American people during the Ebola outbreak in 2014 and 2015. Mr. Trump “has silenced the scientists” and perceives the virus as a conspiracy against him, Mr. Biden said.
Whenever he cracked what seemed to be jokes about Mr. Trump, he quickly silenced laughter or applause for the crowd by saying, “No, I’m serious, folks,” or “I really mean it,” or “That’s not a joke.”
Reinforcing his message was a banner hanging on one side of the court reading “Soul of the Nation.” The court’s scoreboard was set to display a tie game of 20-20 with 20:20 remaining.
As it often does, Mr. Biden’s grief at the loss of his son Beau bubbled up. “Beau’s still — he’s my soul,” Mr. Biden said, pausing for a moment. “We get through it by having purpose in your life to change things. The kind of things the people you lost would want you to do.”
After his remarks, Mr. Biden answered some questions from the audience. He wandered off the stage, discussing gentrification, the importance of labor unions and defending the Affordable Care Act, which Mr. Trump’s administration is pushing to vacate in federal court.
Mr. Biden made a passing reference to Mr. Sanders, saying the country could achieve progressive goals “without us being socialist, without starting a revolution.”
Mr. Biden’s campaign is leaning on the support of elected officials and dignitaries: His campaign has announced more than 1,400 endorsements from national, state and local leaders.
On Friday, the campaign announced support from Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., Hillary Clinton’s running mate in the 2016 presidential election, who endorsed the former vice president.
“Barack Obama wisely chose Joe as his partner in the White House,” Mr. Kaine said in a statement. “And for eight years, Vice President Biden worked hand-in-hand with President Obama to rescue the American economy from catastrophe.”
Mr. Kaine joined five other senators who publicly support Mr. Biden, including Sen. Bob Casey, DPa., who endorsed Mr. Biden the day he launched his campaign.
Earlier this week, Mr. Biden won the endorsement of Rep. Jim Clyburn, a top House Democrat who has represented the South Carolina Lowlands in Congress since 1993.