Forget slave holders like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Never mind Indian deporters like Andrew Jackson. And who ever heard of segregationists Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt?
Joe Biden said Donald Trump is the first racist America has ever elected president.
The 77-year-old presumed Democratic presidential nominee made that remarkable claim at a Wednesday virtual town-hall meeting organized by the Service Employees International Union.
Mr. Biden was asked about Mr. Trump’s use of “China virus” and other reported terminology regarding the novel coronavirus, which originated in China last year.
He replied that Mr. Trump “deals with people based on the color of their skin, their national origin” and went on to say in emphatic terms that this was absolutely without precedent in American history.
“No sitting president has ever done this,” he said, according to an account in the Washington Post. “Never, never, never. No Republican president has done this. No Democratic president.”
Mr. Biden continued in that vein, claiming that racists had only ever tried to be elected president but Mr. Trump was the first to win.
“We’ve had racists, and they’ve existed, they’ve tried to get elected president. He’s the first one that has,” he said.
