President Joe Biden honored service members who sacrificed their lives for a “more perfect union” and U.S. democracy in his Memorial Day remarks.
In his address on Monday, he also spoke about the grief experienced by families of the fallen, touching on the death of his own son Beau, who served in Iraq and died of brain cancer nine years ago.
“Today we join that grief with gratitude to our fallen heroes, their families, and the brave souls who uphold the flame of liberty,” he said.
Before the speech, Biden participated in the traditional wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery.
In his remarks, Biden praised the fallen soldiers who were “bound by a common commitment not to a place, not to a person, not to a president, but to an idea—the idea of the United States of America.”
“Freedom has never been guaranteed. Every generation has had to earn it, fight for it, defend it in the battle between autocracy and democracy, between the greed of a few and the rights of many,” Biden said. “Our democracy is more than a system of government; it’s the soul of America.”
The president had touched on this same topic—a defense of U.S. democracy—in his commencement address to West Point military academy graduates on Saturday. “Nothing is guaranteed about our democracy in America,” Biden told them.
These remarks reflect a recurring theme in Biden’s speeches in recent years, including on the campaign trail. One of his pitches to U.S. voters is that his rival for the White House in the upcoming November presidential election, Republican Donald Trump, poses a fundamental threat to U.S. democracy.
In a post on Truth Social on Monday, Trump also honored fallen military members with an image bearing the message: “We can never replace them. We can never repay them. But we can always remember. Today, that’s what we are doing—we remember.”
In a separate post shortly after, Trump criticized the criminal cases he is facing, writing in part: “Happy Memorial Day to All, including the Human Scum that is working so hard to destroy our Once Great Country.”
Biden was accompanied at Arlington on Monday by Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Austin’s appearance comes days after he briefly turned over his powers to a deputy on Friday for an elective, non-surgical medical procedure that the Pentagon said was unrelated to his recent prostate cancer diagnosis.
editor
If you ever had any doubts about Joe Biden’s state of mental health is, then this is all the evidence you need, he actually believes that US troops fight to protect democracy, if its the same democracy that supplies weapons to a regime that kills kids by the thousand or changes a countries government because the government doesn’t sing to their hymn sheet, then I don’t think that’s the democracy any right thinking person would agree with. I am afraid their track record is none to good on “Protecting Democracy”, they even disobey their own laws, now and then a soldier, sailor or airman gets sick of the delusion and speaks out or a intelligence officer “spills the beans”, not a really good recommendation for “protecting democracy” depends on what you define as democracy?