President Biden, under pressure from Democrats to confront former President Donald J. Trump head-on over Trump’s criminal conviction in his New York hush money case, heeded those calls Monday night during a major fundraiser in Connecticut for his re-election campaign and for the party.
Biden lashed out at his rival at a reception in Greenwich, telling a group of supporters, including Connecticut’s governor and his two sitting U.S. senators, that the campaign had entered “uncharted territory” when a jury found on Thursday Trump guilty of all 34 crimes. serious crimes that he had been facing.
He said Trump had cemented the distinction of being the first former president and convicted felon to seek the Oval Office.
“But as disturbing as it is, more damaging is the all-out attack that Donald Trump is delivering on the American justice system,” Biden said, according to a reporter who covered the event.
Biden called Trump “unhinged” and said he was undermining another democratic institution with his vitriol after the verdict.
“It is reckless and dangerous for anyone to say something is rigged just because they don’t like the outcome,” he said.
A Trump campaign spokesperson, responding to a request for comment Monday night, attacked Biden in a statement and said the president was trying to divert attention from the federal gun charges trial of his son, Hunter. which started on Monday.
Biden’s bravado at the reception, hosted by Richard Plepler, the former CEO of HBO, was a notable shift in his approach to Trump’s conviction by a Manhattan jury.
Asked by reporters at the White House on Friday about the verdict, Biden smiled and quietly walked away after making comments about the war in Gaza. His reluctance to weigh in on the issue was due to his general strategy of avoiding personal involvement with Trump over his legal problems.
Biden’s comments at the fundraiser echoed parts of a televised statement at the White House on Friday before outlining his administration’s latest efforts to end the war between Israel and Hamas. Still, Democrats had asked him to be more aggressive.
Trump’s felon status wasn’t Biden’s only line of attack during the fundraiser.
Biden mentioned the time Trump suggested during a White House coronavirus briefing four years ago that bleach could be used to treat the disease, medical advice that was immediately discredited.
“He must have injected it into his brain,” Biden said, according to a report from the group.
