Biden appeals to Black voters in North Carolina, Trump to Latinos in Nevada
Washington DC, Oct 18 (efe-epa).- United States Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden appealed to the African-American vote at a rally in North Carolina on Sunday, while rival President Donald Trump sought to convince Hispanics at a rally in Nevada.
“We should have no tolerance for extremist white supremacist groups marching and menacing our communities, but if you say ‘we have no need to face racial injustice in this country,’ as he (Trump) says, you haven’t opened your eyes to the truth,” Biden said at the event in Durham, where his supporters listened from their cars as a preventive measure against COVID-19.
Barack Obama’s former vice-president said that he had met family members of victims of police violence against African Americans, including George Floyd and Jacob Blake, in recent months.
“George Floyd’s six-year-old daughter, who I met with her family, I knelt down to say hi to her and she looked at me and said ‘Mister vice president, Daddy changed the world,'” he recalled.
Floyd’s death in Minneapolis in May at the hands of a white police office triggered a wave of racial justice protests across the country.
“Think about what it takes to be a Black person to love this country today… deep love for this country, and for much too long it hasn’t been recognized,” Biden stressed. “We need leadership that de-escalates tensions, open lines of communication and brings us together to heal and to hope.”
Biden made a campaign stop in North Carolina, where early voting for the Nov. 3 election began on Thursday, in an attempt to mobilize voters.
“We gotta keep the incredible momentum going; we can’t let up,” said the Democratic nominee, who encouraged voters not to wait and go to the polling stations as soon as possible.
According to the North Carolina State Board of Elections, 845,268 people have cast their votes so far.
Biden has a narrow lead of 2.7 percentage points over Trump in the state, according to the RealClearPolitics polling average.
In fact, one of the president’s sons, Donald Trump Jr., is planning on Monday to visit the state, where he will hold two rallies, one in Arden and the other in Kernersville, while his father will hold campaign events in Arizona.
The last Democratic candidate to win in North Carolina was former President Barack Obama in 2008 and it is crucial for Trump to hold onto this state.
While Biden was visiting North Carolina, Trump attended a mass at a church in Las Vegas on Sunday before holding a campaign rally in Carson City, the capital of Nevada, another swing state.
The president sat in the front row of the International Church without a mask like most people around him and without maintaining social distance.
“At 4:30, the Lord said to me, I am going to give your president a second wind,” one of the senior pastors of the church, Denise Goulet, said.
“You will be the president again,” she added, addressing Trump.
In a brief speech, the president said that it had been “a great honor” to attend the service.
“I go to many churches and I love going to churches… this has been my third and we’ll be back many times,” he added.
Trump also mentioned the restrictions on churches on account of the coronavirus pandemic.
“This city has been a tough place but the job you’ve done to get people back is really very special. I want to thank you. I will only say this:’we are with you a 100 percent. We are telling you, you better get out cause we have a group on the other side that doesn’t agree with us… and we happen to be right. So get out there on Nov. 3 or sooner and do your thing,” he said.
