Summary

TVU 21 JOE BIDEN EMMETSBURG IA COMMUNITY EVENT ABC UNI 120219 2020 113213 Well I gotta be honest with you here If I got to pitch to only four people in the state to be for me, they're sitting behind me The (?) I've known for a long time And I hope I didn't embarrass you saying you sat in my lap Folks, you know, I hadn't planned on starting this way but you know, one of the reasons why I think it's so important that I spend time in towns like Emmetsburg and all across Iowa and quite frankly, in other states, is because you're the essence of basically what is basically the ethic of America 113303 It's all about the way we were raised, all of you were raised, the way I was raised Everything's about integrity and decency, not a joke We don't always live up to it, but that's what's it's been all about You teach your kids, you teach your kids that (?) matters You teach your children that helping somebody out even if you don't know them that well, if they're in trouble, matters 113329 You teach your kids that it's important how you speak to people A word that's used here in this state and in my home (?) a lot is dignity My dad used to have an expression, he really meant it Everyone, everyone is entitled to be treated with dignity My father would never walk by anyone from a shoeshine guy and someone on the corner who was in need of a little bit of help It's all about treating people with dignity, no matter where they come from 113401 And the four people behind me, as I need not tell you, because you know them extremely well I've known them a long time, but they're the epitome of what constitutes integrity The people who when they say what they're going to do, they do it At least they try to do it, if they can't do it, they tell you I couldn't get it done But they don't walk away 113423 You know, we have so many people today, and I think it's become sort of the biggest thing I've seen change, and I hadn't planned on going this way, but the biggest thing I've seen change in my career is it used to be in the days when I got elected as a 29 year old kid to the Senate, and I was hanging out at your house, you were nice to put me up, was that if somebody said I'm going to be with you in public life, I'm gonna be with you They meant it 113454 They'd take your hand, and that was it You meant it What's happening today, and I think it's about our ethic is changing and why I'm so worried about this president remaining in office, today everything is sort of relative They'll say, I'm with you, I'm gonna vote for you I know -- and you've told them all what it's about And then they come and say, you know, I can't be with you now, because I didn't realize that this or that was gonna happen 113520 I didn't realize my circumstances changed But not here in this county, not here among all of you You don't give a friend a hand and say I'm with you, I'm gonna be there, and then say, well you know, I didn't realize it was gonna be tough I didn't realize it was gonna be inconvenient And, when I start talking about the national ethic, that's kind of what I mean when I talk about integrity It's just being a person of your word 113554 What you say you're gonna do, and even if it gets difficult to do it, you stick with it And you know, the fact is that, Christie talked about, you know, she thinks back to the people, her classmates, people she was raised with It was the same kind of people I was raised with in Scranton, Pennsylvania and in Claymont, Delaware, a little steel town There weren't people in big houses and mansions and, not that there's anything wrong with people who live in big houses and mansions, but there are people who were just busting their neck everyday 113631 Got up everyday, deal with whatever problem they had face, facing them Put one foot in front of the other As my mom would say, didn't whine Just moved on Put their heads down and moved on And they believed that where I come from, and I think where all of you come from that of you're just given half a chance, you can do it Just give me a chance I'm not looking for a handout 113658 Farmers aren't looking for a bailout, they're looking for a chance Just give me a shot My dad used to have an expression Joe, I don't expect the government to give me anything, but I do expect them to understand my problems Just to understand my problem Just not make it harder for me to deal with my problem And that seams to me to be the many times I've been in in Iowa campaigning not just for president, I came out here and campaigned for a lot of candidates, going all the way back to John Culver when he ran for the senate 113734 Going back to a lot of people that have run, most have won, and some haven't But I've gotten to know the state fairly well It almost doesn't matter where you're from There's sort of the Iowa way I really mean it The Iowa way is you just, you just get up and you do it You do it My dad had another expression He said, Joey, you never explain and never complain Just do it, whatever it is 113804 I have a cartoon in my office that sits on my desk that is a picture of my dad, thought I was maybe feeling sorry for myself one day about twenty five years ago He was over at the house And I was talking about my, had lost my daughter and my wife from an accident And my dad was an empathetic guy, but he went up to this Hallmark store in the town I live in and came back with one of those, those little brass plate frames that had two, you know, they have sayings in them sometimes And there were two frames in it, two, a cartoon character Hagar The Horrible Remember that guy, you know the viking, you know 113853 And his ship had been, was up on a rock and was wrecked and the horns on his helmet were charred and emassed and his ship was down He had his hand up and he's looking up and he's saying, Why me God? And the next frame is a voice from heaven saying, why not you? Why not? That's how I was raised That's how most of you were raised You just get up and move on But what worries me that's going on today is the way the system's being rigged, the way that we are, the way our leader, the president -- and by the way, the president's words matter, no matter who the president is 113939 By the way, the reason I'm not walking away from here, my attendance here, and good luck, because I usually wander through But they tell me I can't leave, because all the microphones for the press are up here If I don't want them to hear, then I can walk over here and talk like this But all kidding aside, the -- one of the things that I think has happened is that this president has soiled the soul of this country 114008 He does things and says things that -- forget his policies for a moment He does things and says things that make us feel uneasy about ourselves, about our nation Our children are listening The language he uses The way he refers to people is just so, so, so degrading This is the President made fun of the reporter because he had a tremor I ran into guys like that when I was growing up I used to stutter badly 114048 He would have been the first guy try to make fun of me in front of other people when I was a kid He'd also be the first guy to knock flat onto his rear end, too, if he made fun of me But all kidding aside, think about it And folks, you know, when those folks came out of those fields down in Charlottesville carrying torches, their veins bulging Just picture what you saw on television And screaming hate and bile, chanting the same exact language that was used during the Holocaust in Germany 114128 (?) carrying Nazi flags accompanied by white supremacists and the Ku Klux Klan And a young woman in a group opposing the hate resisted and one young woman was killed When the press asked him to comment on it, remember what he said? He said there very fine people on both sides No president, not president has ever said anything like that with the possible exception of Andrew Jackson before the Civil War It not only stunned America, it shocked the world 114213 You had leaders like the chancellor of Germany saying what, basically, what's going, paraphrasing, what's going on in America? What has happened? Ronald Reagan, to quote a republican, he was talking about the shining city on the hill The United States of America Well, the lights are out, or at least it's not shining right now 114238 And his embrace of dictators and thugs, love letters to Kim Jong un, who is literally a murderous thug who had his uncle's brains blown out sitting across a table in a meeting, his brother assassinated Vladimir Putin, who I know well, I met with him alone as much as anybody has, any world leader Not a decent guy, trying to undo Europe 114318 [brings over a cup of water to a woman coughing] But, think about it Think about it The worst part of this, our children are listening As I said, the president's words matter They can make markets go up or down no matter who the president is They can send brave women and men to war They could bring peace, but they can also breathe oxygen into the hate that's hiding under the rocks It's always been that way in America There's always been some part of America and every country It's not a fairy tale 114355 And folks, it's not healthy And it's completely contrary to the ethic we were all raised with, particularly in small towns and rural America, in the places I was raised That's the glue that holds us together You can't define for me what an American is based on ethnicity You can't define for me what American is based on a religious beliefs You can't define for me what America is based on, on much of anything other than a commitment to the notion, it sounds corny, but we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men and women are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, life, liberty 114443 Sounds corny, but that's all we really believe -- that's who we are That's who the rest of the world believes we are We've never lived up to it completely But we've always opened the aperture more wider and wider and wider to include more people This is the first president in my lifetime, and I think the first president a long, long time, who has shut it down, walked away from it So, folks, you know, I'm running for, for three basic reasons 114515 One is I do think and I mean, sincerely, we have to restore the soul of America Number two, we have to also rebuild the backbone of America, working class, middle class people Wall Street didn't build America We built America My dad, high school educated, my dad, my mom, my grand-pop, my grandmother, they built America, because they were given half a chance 114545 Well when they country's been given half a chance, they have never, never, never, never, never, ever let their country down Not once In war and peace, never have let their country down But we're so divided now Our politics has become so ugly and personal It's got to change For our safety's sake, he's got to change And you know what? Four years with Donald Trump, we can overcome, with difficulty There will be a lot of repairing to do I'm not being -- I'm not exaggerating I don't think A lot of repair in terms of our foreign policy, which has really been shattered, as well as bringing the country together again so we don't view sort of enemy camps 114640 And the other thing is that, you know, I think I can beat Donald Trump I believe -- and I know Donald Trump thinks I can beat Donald Trump That's why he's spending millions of dollars to tell lies about me and my son -- running ten million dollars of ads that the major networks won't even put on, because they know they're lies 114704 But that's his game That's what he does But the reason why I'm gonna beat Donald Trump and why I think it's so important is not because I want to be president, it's because I don't want him to be president any longer 114726 Because -- They know I'm going to protect the middle class, not just the wealthy And they know that I will stand up to dictators, and the dictators know me and they know I know who they are And I'm gonna, I'm gonna expand, not try to eliminate it like he's trying to do And I'm also gonna make sure we reverse the climate crisis we face in America and not exacerbate it He's not only not fighting it, he's making it much, much worse 114800 But here's the major point You know, the thing about Iowa is every four years, this is where democracy starts Democracy begins in Iowa Not a joke You are the first people to take a look at all of us And you do look at all of us closely, which is a good thing You're the first people and you're sort of the starting gate, man You're the ones that open the gate And I'm gonna respectfully suggest that not because I'm running but because who's president, the job you have has never been more important than it is today 114845 Because if we in fact, if I or whomever, any one of you, we make a fundamental mistake, and we pick someone who can't be Donald Trump, our kids are going to suffer the consequences for a long time, because four years we can overcome, but eight years will fundamentally change the character who we are as a nation Because I think character, literally the character of the country, is on the ballot this time 114910 And that's the reason I'm taking this 650 mile tour through rural Iowa, because you represent the character of the country It's not hyperbole You represent the character, what people think of us as being Hardworking, decent, honest people who have in fact, fed the country, fueled the country, and are in trouble right now 114942 And so, folks, look, one of the things that I'm -- I think is so important for us to do is that this president has chosen, for example, oil companies over farmers The ethanol plants Look, look at the promise that was made Look what's happening now Iowa's growing Iowa's moving You were able to -- when under our administration, income, farm income was the highest it's ever been, because we had Tom -- I'm not being facetious -- as the secretary of agriculture, but it's true 115026 It was Because we understood the heart of the country And folks, I know it's not believable, but I come from a rural state Delaware is viewed as an eastern state -- and if you even think it's a state, it is, I promise you A lot of you have said, oh I've been to Delaware, Rhode Island I've been there But the fact is that, two-thirds of my state is rural Largest town in the bottom three quarter, two thirds of the state is 20,000 people Next one after, that's about 14,000 people 115100 Mostly agriculture Mostly, mostly chickens It's a major industry It's about a four billion dollar industry in the Delmarva Peninsula And folks, the fact is that there's so much we can do in rural America to fuel the rest of the country I've laid out a, with Tom's incredible help, I've laid out a rural plan for America enough and a farm plan for America I think if we take a good look at it, we don't have time to go into it all now, I think you'll find that it is serious, and it's real 115137 But this president, this president is going to spend most of his time, the rest of his campaign fanning the flames of hate, embracing those dictators, separating families and ripping children from the arms and their mothers at borders No matter what you think about immigration, that is not right And spouting lies and conspiracy theories This guy has no regard for the law 115206 None This is a guy who said, we all laughed when he announced, I can shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it Well he has been getting away with it, for real He shot holes in the Constitution in a way no other president has, and he's convinced he can get away with it Well, folks, he's getting away with one thing, damaging the rural economy to a point that we'd better get going or we're gonna have trouble restoring it 115242 The fact is that Iowa State University just pointed out that 44 percent of Iowa farmers last year struggled just to pay their basic bills This a crisis that strikes at the heart of the country When I talk about restoring the middle class, I'm talking about restoring the middle class in rural America, for rural America, because we need it to be here Your children should not, when they graduate from school, decide the only place they got to go, they gotta leave, there's no job, there's no place to stay 115315 There's enormous opportunities in rural America Look, the fact is that I want to lead all of you, look out there, as I said, you're not looking for a payoff You're looking for an opportunity A opportunity to lead in your communities, lead in our economy, lead in the world Our AG producers should be on the cutting edge of a significant change that needs to take place to deal with climate but also to deal with feeding the world and becoming once again the single biggest producers of the change that's needed in America 115352 Folks, you're gonna be able to store carbon in the soil You're going to get paid for it You're going to be able to convert waste into new materials in fabric and fibers and chemicals and fuel We're going to invest in renewable energy again and biofuels, creating millions of new jobs that are good paying jobs, not fifteen dollars an hour, forty five dollars an hour jobs Creating a lot of work for a whole lot of people Our ethanol plants provide good jobs 115422 They're also going to see bio manufacturers spouting up if I'm elected president with Tom's help All across this state, not one giant facility, but every 10, 15 miles, you will see the impacts that we can have on climate change by a new wave of bio manufacturing as well We're going to invest in efficient infrastructures, create jobs, allow small communities to access markets across the globe and can withstand, withstand impacts of climate change 115453 Folks, no longer will a family be faced with the children having to make a decision Mom and dad, there's nothing for me here I'm leaving I'm moving Look, the central promise of America has always been that anyone, if they work at it, can succeed Well we can do that And rural America can lead the world, can lead the nation, can be the first group of folks in the world that get to net zero, net zero emissions by being able to do all that's within your capacity and provide so many different options to make money off the land, to do so much, so much more than just feed us 115538 Folks -- [phone starts ringing] -- But keeping that promise is gonna take someone with some proven ability -- that's the president calling me Tell him I'm busy He does it all the time He does it all the time [laughter and applause] He's on his way to NATO and he wants to know who our NATO allies are He hasn't figured it out yet That's almost true 115606 Let me conclude by saying that I believe that the next president, the next candidate for president has to not only be able to beat Donald Trump, but has to be able to bring along a Democratic Senate The changes I want to make are significant Health care with a public option that everybody can -- Nobody has more than a thousand dollar copay It costs a lot of money It costs over seven hundred million dollars, but it doesn't cost 35 billion -- trillion dollars to get it done Everybody will have access 115644 Keeping drug prices down I won't go into it now unless you want me to when we talk about this a little bit later, but there's all the things are in our power to do now, now But if you remember, the administrations that were thought to have made significant breakthroughs in policy from Franklin Roosevelt to Lyndon Johnson, what were they able to do as well? They not only got elected, they helped elect United States senators in other states 115711 They helped elect additional Congress persons to others states, to give them the majorities they needed And I'm gonna say something that is both self-serving, and but I think true In all those states we have to win, I am, I do pretty well And I'm able to bring along those people The last -- in 2018, Trump had had the White House, had the White House and the Senate and the House of Representatives 115744 I went into a total of 24 states, campaigned for over 65 candidates I was foolish enough to announce on the front end I thought we'd win over 41 seats and beat 41 Republicans, take back the House Well, we did We did And there were purple states, and there were red states And we went in and we just made the case We didn't lie We said, this is what your Republican senator congressman believes This is what they stood for We're against that Take a look at our for our folks 115816 We won So, folks, I believe I can beat Donald Trump I believe we will be Donald Trump I believe Donald Trump believes we'll beat Donald Trump And I think that we're not only going to beat him With your help, I think we can beat him like a drum Thank you very, very much And with that, let me turn this over to, close out to your former governor and my secretary of agriculture 115950 One great thing about the present United States that I worked with, when he gave me authority, he gave me an assignment, he gave me presidential power For real I was able to make decisions without having to go back to him, because we knew were simpatico And I could, I could ask anyone in the administration to help me do anything I had to do from dealing with the nine hundred billion dollars we spent on economic recovery all the way down to dealing with trying to figure out how to deal with assault weapons that are killing kids in schools 115922 And the first guy I went to for everything was Tom And so, ladies and gentlemen, let me give you your former governor, one of the brightest guys I've ever worked with in my life, knows how to get things done Tom Vilsack ####