It was difficult to know whether Joe Biden or President Trump would appear Thursday in south central Pennsylvania from the gazes of crowds gathered near the Democratic candidate’s alleged campaign stop.
Trump supporters were in force in Lancaster, holding Trump posters and singing “Four More Years!” and use!” as they gathered approximately 100 yards from where Biden would be revealing his health care proposals.
At one point, a large truck, with photos of Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, pulled up in front of a local recreation center where a pro-Trump crowd gathered.
BIDEN AIMS AT TRUMP ON HEALTH CARE DURING THE STATE STOP BATTLEGROUND
The truck came between Trump supporters and another nearby group that declared their support for the Black Lives Matter movement.
Biden traveled to the battlefield state to meet with families who said they had benefited from the Affordable Care Act, the health care legislation also known as ObamaCare that was passed when Biden was the vice president of former President Barack Obama. The campaign arrest came on the same day the Trump administration was expected to urge the Supreme Court to invalidate the national health care law.
“I think it’s cruel, it’s cruel, callous,” Biden said of Trump’s attempts to dismantle ObamaCare. “It is all because, in my opinion, he cannot bear the thought of leaving one of President Obama’s great achievements standing.”
Biden also criticized Trump’s notion that fewer tests would mean fewer cases of coronavirus, as health experts have insisted on the importance of tests to limit the spread of the virus and identify those infected.
“He called the evidence, quote, a double-edged sword,” Biden said. “Let’s be clear about what you mean by that. Evidence unambiguously saves lives, and widespread testing is the key to opening up our economy. That is an edge of the sword. On the other hand, he believes that finding out that more Americans are sick will make him look bad. ”
Democratic presidential candidate, former Vice President Joe Biden speaks with families who have benefited from the Affordable Care Act, Thursday, June 25, 2020, in Lancaster, Pa. (Associated Press)
Biden also wrongly claimed that 120 million people had died from the new coronavirus during the campaign’s arrest, exaggerating the number about 100 times.
“People don’t have a job, people don’t know where to go, they don’t know what to do,” Biden said Thursday. “We now have more than 120 million deaths from COVID.”
The United States has seen at least 124,000 deaths, not millions, from COVID-19, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Globally, more than 488,824 deaths from the virus have been reported.
Biden’s comments were immediately questioned by Republicans and the Trump 2020 Campaign team, who deemed the Democrat “very confused.”
BIDEN SLAMMED AFTER SUCH INCORRECTLY SAYING ‘WE HAVE MORE THAN 120 MILLION DEAD OF COVID
“WHAT’S GOING ON WITH JOE BIDEN?” Steve Guest, quick response director of the Republican National Committee, tweeted with a link to the clip.
Biden snub the local media?
Meanwhile, the Lancaster-based LNP newspaper said it was not allowed to enter the building during Biden’s appearance, and suggested that the Democratic campaign was limiting the ability of local media to report on the visit. Lancaster’s WGAL-TV claimed that it was the only local television station in the Susquehanna Valley area that spoke to Biden one-on-one.
Biden recently began making more public appearances after months indoors in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
His campaign so far has focused on small-group meetings to limit the potential spread of the coronavirus, in contrast to President Trump, who recently held protests in Tulsa, Oklahoma and Phoenix.
After the June 20 event in Tulsa, dozens of Secret Service members were forced into quarantine because at least two of them had tested positive for the virus.
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“Donald Trump must stop worrying about his appearance to start worrying about what the United States has happened to the rest of the United States,” Biden said.
Paul Steinhauser, Madeleine Rivera and Andrew O’Reilly of Fox News contributed to this story.
