President Joe Biden broke his recent public silence today with a direct and impassioned critique of Trump, accusing him of planning to slash Social Security benefits.
“I won’t stand by while Donald Trump tries to pull the rug out from under millions of American seniors,” Biden declared. “Social Security is a sacred promise. We paid into it. We earned it.
The speech marks Biden’s first speech since leaving the White House.
While Trump has recently walked back previous remarks about cuts to Social Security and Medicare, Biden pointed to multiple past statements, including a 2020 interview in which Trump floated the idea of “looking at entitlements down the road.”
“You can’t erase the tape,” Biden said. “The American people remember what you said — and more importantly, they remember who fought to protect their dignity, and who didn’t.”
Republicans quickly fired back. A spokesperson for the Trump campaign called Biden’s remarks “desperate fear-mongering” and accused the administration of mismanaging the economy, endangering Social Security’s long-term viability.
But Biden wasn’t backing down.
Biden added: “People are now genuinely concerned for the first time in history — for the first and only time in history — that their Social Security benefits may be delayed or interrupted. They’ve gotten it during wartime, during recessions, during the pandemic — no matter what they got it. But now, for the first time ever, that may change. It would be a calamity for millions of families, millions of people.”
“This isn’t just policy — it’s personal,” he said. “I’ve met too many folks who rely on that check every month. They deserve peace of mind, not political games.”