With three days of “decisive” elections in the United States, President Joe Biden and his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama, urged on Saturday to “vote” to protect “democracy”, their opponent Donald Trump wanting a “giant wave” Republican to “save the American dream”.
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During a marathon day of concurrent meetings in Pennsylvania, a crucial state for the November 8 midterm legislative elections, the 46e (Biden) and 44e (Obama) White House tenants clashed remotely on 45e (Trump) before an election that will lay the foundations for the 2024 presidential election.
“Democracy is literally on the ballot. This is a decisive moment for the nation and we must all speak with one voice”, launched Joe Biden, under a blue and red light, a huge American flag and the ovations in a room in Philadelphia, cradle of the Constitution. American at the end of the XVIIIe century.
All the spotlight is on Pennsylvania, a former steel-making bastion, where Republican multi-millionaire surgeon Mehmet Oz, a Donald Trump-esque TV star, faces off against bald colossus and former small-town Democratic mayor John Fetterman for the most contested seat in the Senate.
Because of this position of senator undoubtedly depends the balance of the powers of the upper house of Congress, with immense power.
On Tuesday, November 8, the Americans are also called upon to renew the entire House of Representatives. Governors and local elected officials, who decide their state’s policies on abortion or the environment, are also at stake.
Mr. Obama, for whom the nostalgia is on full display, was first in Pittsburgh, an industrial city in Pennsylvania, where he asked “Pookie cousins” and “Uncle Joes” – an affectionate nickname he gives to demobilized voters – sunk in their sofa, to get up and “go vote!” Tuesday for Democrats.
Obama, “I love you!”
“I like you!” then threw someone in the crowd at him.
“I love you too, but you have to go vote!” replied the politician with obvious oratorical talents and charisma.
He acknowledged that “the whole country has gone through difficult times in recent years”, in particular because of a “historic pandemic”.
But the father of health insurance “Obamacare” attacked Republicans, who want to “dismember Social Security and Medicare and give the rich and big business more tax cuts.”
Alongside Joe Biden, his former vice president, in Philadelphia, Barack Obama also hoarsely asked to protect “democracy on the ballot [car] the stakes are high”.
“It is very important that the Democrats stay” in power, added Jennifer Hahn, a 57-year-old psychologist who lined up for hundreds of meters under a magnificent autumn sun to attend the meeting of Biden, Obama and Fetterman.
For this Democrat, “climate change, gun violence and the violation of individual rights” are the most crucial issues of the ballot.
Jacqueline Smythe, 30, also fears a backlash on abortion after the Supreme Court blasted this federal right last June. She finds the Republican Party akin to a “dictatorship”.
“Giant Wave”
In the evening, still in Pennsylvania, in the city of Latrobe, the hero of the Republicans, ex-President Trump (2017-2021), red cap “Make America Great Again” pressed on his head and hiding his gaze, very long called for a “giant wave” from his party to “stop the destruction of the country and save the American dream.”
After a fierce campaign centered on inflation, the Republicans are showing their confidence in their chances of depriving the Democratic President of his majorities on November 8th.
If their predictions are confirmed, the 76-year-old businessman seems determined to take advantage of it to formalize his candidacy for the presidency of 2024 as soon as possible, with an air of revenge for his defeat in 2020.
“We need to get our country back,” one supporter at Latrobe meetings, Shawn Ecker Grey, 44, said while Leslie Boswell said “love it.[r] Trump because he supports everything [elle] believe[t]”.
Joe Biden has so far said he wants to run again, but the prospect does not appeal to all Democrats because of his age – soon to be 80 – and his unpopularity.
The Democratic leader is trying to convince Americans that this election is “a choice”: on the future of abortion or same-sex marriage – all subjects on which he has promised to legislate if he obtains solid majorities in Congress.
But it is the rise in prices – 8.2% inflation on average over one year – which remains by far the main concern of Americans, and Joe Biden’s efforts to pose as “president of the middle class” are struggling. to bear fruit.