Biden Slams Trump During Wisconsin Virtual Campaign Events

Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden reached out to Wisconsin voters during two virtual campaign events Wednesday, criticizing President Donald Trump, showcasing his policies aimed at supporting rural communities, and illustrating how different a presidential campaign looks during a global pandemic.

The former vice president held a virtual rally aimed at Milwaukee voters Wednesday afternoon and an online roundtable discussion targeting La Crosse area voters earlier in the day. The events represented a new reality for state and local politicians attempting to campaign and connect with voters ahead of November’s election.

During the rally aimed at Milwaukee voters, which Biden participated in through a video stream from his Delaware home, he criticized Trump’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, saying he has “irresponsibly downplayed and delayed action on the virus.”

Biden argued the Trump administration has mishandled the distribution of relief funds, saying more should have been done to support small businesses. He contended the president isn’t up to the task of helping the American economy through the pandemic or in its aftermath.

“He thinks he’s a builder, but he’s a destroyer of everything he touches,” Biden said. “All he’s ever done is hollow out what really matters and then slap a gold sign on the flimsy foundation.”

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Other participants in the virtual rally, who also joined via video conference, included Wisconsin U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore, Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett.

“President Trump has exhibited an absolute failure of leadership,” Baldwin said. “We’ve only seen his failure in leadership grow worse and worse.”

On a call with reporters before Biden’s event, former Gov. Scott Walker defended the Trump administration’s action surrounding COVID-19, including the federal Paycheck Protection Program.

“We know that this president has the capacity, as he’s already shown with the national economy before, to continue to do it again, to get us on the right track,” Walker said.

During the event aimed at La Crosse voters, an online roundtable discussion with Wisconsin U.S. Rep. Ron Kind and local leaders, Biden highlighted proposals he believes will help rural communities in Wisconsin.

Biden said rural areas have taken a big financial hit during the pandemic.

“The pain has been especially profound in rural America,” Biden said. “As you all know, though, it wasn’t easy for rural American families before this crisis hit, before COVID-19.”

Biden argued Trump’s trade policies have contributed to record dairy farm closures in Wisconsin, because of increased export tariffs on some products. He said he would take a different approach to international deals.

“Each (farm closure) is a tragedy and so much of that devastation is directly attributable, I think, to the disastrous trade war the president got us into,” Biden said.

Biden also said the federal government should be buying up farmers’ products that would have normally been purchased by restaurants and schools, whose demand for the products has sharply declined during the pandemic, and send them to food pantries, which are reporting surges in visits.

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He also spoke about the need to expand rural broadband services across the country and for the federal government to put more money behind supporting small businesses rather than large corporations.

“Not one more penny should go to a Fortune 500 company — period,” Biden said. “They don’t need it. We have to keep Main Street open, because it’s the heart and soul that makes everything beat.”

Reaching out to rural voters is a crucial element of the Biden campaign’s strategy for defeating Trump in the fall. The president’s success in rural communities was key to his victory in 2016.

Kind, a Democrat, has represented western Wisconsin in Congress since 1997 and won reelection in 2018 with about 60 percent of the vote. Liberal voters in the district’s more populous cities, La Crosse and Eau Claire, have been critical to his success.

Trump rallied Wisconsin voters at a Milwaukee campaign stop in January and was scheduled to return there in March, but the event was cancelled because of the COVID-19 outbreak.

During a Wednesday morning call with reporters organized by the Trump campaign, Wisconsin Republican Party chair Andrew Hitt said GOP strategists have been using phone calls, texts and social media during the pandemic to campaign for the president’s reelection.

“This campaign, the president’s campaign, is hitting on all cylinders already,” Hitt said, calling Biden’s efforts “anemic.”

Walker, who joined Hitt on the call, said Biden’s economic policies, particularly his attitude toward the Green New Deal, would hurt rural economies.

“Joe Biden has gone from the (Democratic) primary where he tried to position himself as kind of reasonable to now he’s embracing these far out ideas,” Walker said. “Those ideas would be devastating for Wisconsin.”

Biden’s campaign says he supports the Green New Deal “as a framework” for climate policy changes.

The Green New Deal sets a goal of working with farmers to limit greenhouse gas emissions, including methane gas, “as much as is technologically feasible.” Walker said working to limit methane emissions would hurt the dairy industry, because cows generate methane gas.

The latest poll from Marquette University Law School, released earlier this month, found Trump trailing Biden 46-43 in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup. That was within the poll’s 4 point margin of error.

Wisconsin is considered one of the most critical swing states in the 2020 presidential election.