Biden slams Trump on violence
Several US cities see gun violence; cop shot dead in St Louis; Portland still tense
WASHINGTON/ PORTLAND: Joe Biden is mounting the most aggressive attack yet on the US president in a rare public appearance on Monday in the swing state of Pennsylvania asking voters: “Are you safe in Donald Trump’s America?” - as violence roiled its cities. “This president long ago forfeited any moral leadership in this country,” the Democratic presidential candidate is to say, according to excerpts released in advance by his campaign. “He can’t stop the violence - because for years he has fomented it.” Biden’s speech comes as unrest sweeps the US from Portland, Oregon, to Kenosha, Wisconsin, in a country dealing with a multitude of crises such as the coronavirus pandemic, police shootings, a struggling economy and natural disasters. Emerging from months of Covid-19 travel restrictions, Biden finds himself suddenly on the defensive, mocked by Trump as weak in the face of chaotic unrest combining leftist anti-racism protests, riots, deadly shootings and right-wing vigilante actions. Trump has been quick to condemn violence at anti-racism protests, blaming it on “thugs”, “anarchists”, “agitators” and “criminals”, and left-wing radicals, whom he tried to link to Biden. But he was slow to criticise killings by white police officers and white supremacists. Biden has been under mounting pressure to condemn violence at the protests and dissociate himself from left-wing activists involved in some of them. On Sunday, he tweeted, “I condemn violence of every kind by anyone, whether on the left or the right. And I challenge Donald Trump to do the same.” Hours later, Trump tweeted, “When is Slow Joe Biden going to criticize the Anarchists, Thugs & Agitators in ANTIFA (anti-fascists)?” “Rest in Peace Jay,” Trump said in another tweet, referring to Jay Bishop, who was identified as the man shot dead in Portland on Saturday as a caravan of Trump supporters rolled through the city. The weekend also saw several incidents of gun violence in American cities, even as Trump is positioning himself as ‘the law and order president’. One police officer was shot dead and another wounded by an armed gunman in St Louis, Missouri. The incident was not related to the protests and authorities have said the suspect had a criminal history. Four people were shot and injured on Sunday at a night club in Kansas City, Missouri, the same spot where a mass shooting had occurred in January. One person was shot dead and five others injured at a restaurant in Chicago. On Monday, Oregon state police returned to Portland, which saw tensions every night for nearly three months following the death in May of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, after a Minneapolis cop knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes. Saturday’s shooting in the city followed a week of national protests over the police shooting in Kenosha of Jacob Blake on August 23, which left him paralysed. Last week, a 17-year-old Trump supporter shot three people, two fatally, during a protest in Kenosha. Trump, who had deployed federal forces to Portland in July, denounced its mayor Ted Wheeler as “weak” on crime. Wheeler said it was Trump who “created the hate and the division”. Trump is set to travel to Kenosha on Tuesday.