October 12, 2020

Joe Biden breathed populist fire in Toledo, Ohio Monday with a speech aimed straight at the heart of those disgruntled Democrats who voted for Donald Trump in 2016.

After pointing out that Trump has not convened a working group from Congress to craft a coronavirus relief bill, Biden's voice rose.

"He spent too much time in the bunker of his golf course than in the Oval Office," he taunted.

And then came the thunder. "He’s turned his back on you," he shouted. "I will never do that!"

The best part of these car rally appearances are the honks that come back to him as applause. You love to see it.

His full remarks as prepared for delivery are below.

Hello, Toledo!

Mr. Mayor, thanks for the passport to the city.

Thank you, Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, for being here.

There’s no more fierce defender for people she grew up with than Marcy.

She’s never forgotten where she came from. She’s tough. She’s a straight shooter. She’s influential in the Congress. And she sees you.

To Tony Totty, President of Local 14, thanks for hosting.

And Kenyatta, thanks for that introduction and all you did for Barack and me – getting us elected and helping us govern.

You remind me of something my Dad used to say, “Joey, a job is about a lot more than a paycheck. It’s about dignity. It’s about your place in the community. It’s about being able to look your kid in the eye and say that everything will be ok — and mean it.”

That’s a lesson I grew up with surrounded by hard-working families in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Claymont, Delaware. Just like here in Toledo.

But times are hard. Unemployment is way up due to the pandemic.

The economic outlook remains uncertain across Ohio and the country, folks are worried about making their next rent or mortgage payment, whether or not they can purchase their prescription or put food on the table.

Worried about school and their kids.

They see the people at the very top doing better than ever, while they’re left to wonder: “who’s looking out for me?”

That’s Donald Trump’s presidency.

215,000 dead because of COVID-19.

Experts say we’ll lose nearly another 200,000 lives in the next few months.

All because this President is only worried about the stock market, because he refuses to follow science.

It’s estimated that if we just wore masks nationally we’d save almost 100,000 lives over the next few months.

In his own words, this President knew back in January when he was briefed in detail by the intelligence community that this was an extremely dangerous and communicable disease.

He went on a taped interview with Bob Woodward, the journalist, telling him he knew how dangerous this disease was.

But he did nothing.

Ask yourselves, why didn’t he tell the country?

He said nothing.

He told Bob Woodward that he didn’t want to panic the American public.

We don’t panic. But he did.

His reckless personal conduct since his diagnosis, is unconscionable.

And the longer Donald Trump is president, the more reckless he gets.

Dr. Fauci referred to the President’s announcement to the Supreme Court in the Rose
Garden as a super spreader event.

And how is he responding?

He’s running a national ad, quoting Dr. Fauci out of context.

He had said way back in March referring to public health officials, “I can’t imagine that anybody could be doing more.”

Yet Trump and his campaign deliberately lied–making it sound like Fauci was talking about him.

Fauci went public after the ad came out, saying, “I did not give permission to use that quote.”

He wasn’t referring to the President.

And even after Fauci said that he did not say that, Trump and the campaign said they would continue to use the ad, knowing it was a lie.

As a consequence to this overwhelming lying, misleading, and irresponsible action on the part of
Donald Trump, how many empty chairs are there around the dinner table because of his negligence?

I view this campaign between Scranton and Park Avenue.

Between Toledo and Park Avenue.

All Trump can see from Park Avenue is Wall Street.

That’s why the only metric of American prosperity that he values is the Dow Jones.

Like a lot of you, I spent a lot of my life with guys like Donald Trump looking down on me, guys who thought they were better than me because they had a lot of money.

Guys who inherited everything they ever got and still managed to squander it.

I have to admit, I’ve still got a little chip on my shoulder about it.

I read some stories that said if I got elected, I’d be the first guy in a long time to be elected President without an Ivy League degree, like somehow a state school guy couldn’t do the job.

Folks, I know what it takes to be president.

My Mom taught me what you were probably taught too. She’d say, “Joey, no one is better than you. And everyone is your equal.”

I don’t measure people by the size of their bank account. I don’t respect people based on whether they own a mansion, and I don’t judge their worth based on what country club they belong to.

You and I measure people by the strength of their character, honesty, recognizing some things are bigger than their own self interest.

For us, it’s about family. Decency. Honor. Opportunity.

Those are the values I learned growing up in Scranton.

And my guess is those are the values you learned too.

The people I grew up with in Scranton didn’t have money in stocks.

In our house, growing up, every penny my dad made went to pay our bills and take care of our family, and we looked out for our neighbors.

That’s why I have a different measure by which I judge the health of the American economy.

I see the hard working women and men who are just trying to earn an honest living and take care of their families.

We’re not asking for anything — just a shot.

And you know, given a shot, the American people have never ever let their country down.

Just think back to 2008: Barack and I were elected and inherited the worst recession short of the Great Depression.

He put me in charge of the Recovery Act. $800 billion needed to get out to save our economy.

We did it with less than two tenths percent of waste or fraud, and we were able to see to it that Ohio and the other states received substantial assistance to address the economic pain, recover, and rebuild.

To make sure we kept teachers, firefighters, cops, public nurses, on the job. So they didn’t have to be fired because of the lack of money.

We started the longest sustained recovery in American history.

But you know what Mitch McConnell said recently about helping the states? He said “let them go bankrupt.”

We’ve heard that before, right? Republicans said the same thing about the auto industry.

The auto industry that supported 1 in 8 Ohioans was on the brink. It was more than ten years ago, but you remember it like it was yesterday.

But Barack and I bet on you, the American worker, and it paid off.

I argued the American auto worker was the finest auto worker in the world.

They didn’t make the mistake. Management did.

And so over the objection of many, we stepped in and rescued the automobile industry. General Motors and Chrysler. Saving one million jobs.

And then what happened when Donald Trump came to office?

Remember what Trump said in 2017 in Lordstown — “Don’t move, don’t sell your house.”

But Lordstown shut down on Trump’s watch.

After the debate in Cleveland, I met with an elementary school teacher from Lordstown.

Her husband was one of the workers who lost his job. He had to accept a transfer to a plant 8-hours away to maintain his healthcare and pension.

He now drives 16 hours every weekend to see her and their two kids.

But Donald Trump’s betrayal doesn’t stop there.

He betrayed union workers at Goodyear when he called for a boycott of their tires based on a
personal grudge.

He passed a tax bill for the super wealthy and corporations that actually provided incentives for companies to move jobs and production overseas.

Folks, manufacturing is the backbone of our economy.

But we were in a manufacturing recession because of Donald Trump, even before COVID hit.

We’re down 647,000 manufacturing jobs nationwide since the crisis started.

There are still 10,900 lost auto manufacturing jobs in Ohio that have not come back.

The Trump presidency will be the first presidency in modern American history to leave office with fewer jobs than when it began.

And Donald Trump’s only plan is more tax cuts for the super wealthy.

$30 Billion just for the gains the hundred richest billionaires have made this year alone.

In the middle of this pandemic, why do the Republicans have the time to hold a hearing on the Supreme Court instead of providing the significant economic need to localities?

I’ll tell you why. It’s all about wiping the Affordable Care Act off the books. Because their nominee has said in the past — that the law should be struck down.

His relentless effort to eliminate the Affordable Care Act which provided health coverage for 20 million people — and protections for over 100 million people with preexisting conditions.

And he has even pledged to “terminate” the tax that is dedicated to financing Social Security. You know what that’ll do?

The Social Security Actuary says it could lead to Social Security going bankrupt by the middle of 2023.

And not once has President Trump called a high level meeting with Democrats and Republicans to the White House to deliver a new COVID relief package for working families and small business owners.

He spent too much time in the bunker of his golf course than in the Oval Office.

He’s turned his back on you. I will never do that.

That’s why my Build Back Better plan — is built around a simple concept: It’s time we reward hard work in America, not wealth.

An independent analysis put out by Moody’s, a well-respected Wall Street firm, projects that my plan will create 18.6 million jobs — 7 million more jobs than the President’s economic plan and $1 trillion more in economic growth than the President’s plan.

Here’s how my plan works.

I’m not going to raise taxes on anyone who makes less than $400,000 a year — you won’t pay a penny more.

In fact, tens of millions of middle-class families will get tax cuts when you need it most: when you are raising your children, trying to get affordable health care, buying your first home, or saving for retirement.

But I’ll ask big corporations and the wealthy to pay their fair share.

The money we raise will allow us to invest in working people and growing the middle class and make sure everyone is included in the deal.

My plan will create millions of good-paying union jobs in manufacturing building the products and technologies we will need now and in the future.

It starts with a pretty basic idea: when we spend taxpayer money, we should use it to buy American products and support American jobs.

During my first term alone, we’ll invest $400 billion to purchase American-made products and materials we need to modernize our infrastructure, replenish our critical stockpiles, and enhance our national security.

We’ll invest $2 trillion to build more resilient infrastructure:

Roads, bridges, ports. 1.5 million new affordable housing units. High-speech broadband, for every American household — more important than ever. $100 billion to rebuild crumbling schools. Retrofit 4 million buildings, weatherize 2 million homes.

All done by certified union labor.

We’re going to end the Trump incentives for sending jobs overseas.

Any company that offshores jobs will pay a 10 percent penalty.

But any company that brings jobs back, or reopens a closed factory — like a manufacturing plant — will get a 10 percent credit off that investment.

We’ll have a trade strategy that fights for every American worker and every American job and actually gets results.

Not Trump’s chaotic trade threats, erratic tweets, and bluster that’s only stiffed American workers and consumers. He’s let you down. I will stand up to China’s trade abuses. I will invest in you.

Because I know no one can outcompete the American worker when you’re given a fair shot.

And one more thing.

The United States government owns and maintains an enormous fleet of vehicles.

We’re going to convert those government fleets to electric vehicles — made and sourced right here in the United States of America.

With the government providing the demand and supports to re-tool factories that are struggling to compete, the U.S. auto industry will step up.

It’ll expand capacity so that the United States — not China — leads the world in clean vehicle production.

And we’re going to make it easier for American consumers to switch to fuel efficient vehicles.

By building a network of 500,000 charging stations across the country, and by offering consumer rebates to swap older, fuel inefficient vehicles for new, clean, American-made models.

Together, this will mean one million good new jobs in the American auto industry.

It’s an example of how we can do anything. We are America. Nothing can stop us.

We just have to come together. That’s why I’m running as a proud Democrat — but I will govern as an American president.

We can be better than what we’ve seen. We can be what we are at our best — the United States of America.

So vote. Visit IWillote.com/OH.

God bless you. May God protect our troops.

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