Former Vice President and 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden attacked President Trump by invoking the KKK in an interview about the mass shootings in Texas and Ohio.
On CNN, Biden said the country had previously dealt with white supremacy in the 1920’s.
The Daily Mail reports:
We went through this before in the ’20s with the Ku Klux Klan,’ he said, ‘50,000 people walking down Pennsylvania Avenue in pointed hats and robes because they in fact decided they didn’t want any Catholics coming into the country.’
Biden focused on the Texas shootings where the suspected gunman expressed white supremacist and racist views about immigrants in a manifesto.
During the interview, CNN host Anderson Cooper asked a leading question about the president’s tone in generating a violent reaction by providing white supremacists “a dog whistle.”
Biden responded, “They do have a dog whistle. They do have a dog whistle.”
On Twitter, Biden echoed the same sentiment about President Trump.
Let's be very clear. You use the office of the presidency to encourage and embolden white supremacy. You use words like "infestation" and "invasion" to talk about human beings. We won't truly speak with one voice against hatred until your voice is no longer in the White House. https://t.co/CW3wxxTm2E
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 5, 2019
Beto O’Rourke, another 2020 presidential candidate, made similar comments following the Texas shooting.
O’Rourke blamed President Trump for the mass shootings.
You cannot leave it up to me. Members of the press: You too have to call him out for being the most racist president since Andrew Johnson. pic.twitter.com/bsrrth4p0K
— Beto O'Rourke (@BetoORourke) August 6, 2019
Biden also called for an assault weapons ban during the CNN interview and repeated the same view on Twitter.
Assault weapons and high-capacity magazines don’t belong on our streets. We must stand up to the @NRA and gun manufacturers—they don’t own this country. We the people own this country.
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 4, 2019
Biden and O’Rourke are exploiting a national tragedy to boost their presidential campaigns.