US President Joe Biden intended on Friday to compare the risks posed by Nazi Germany to those that the world faces today from tyrants and authoritarianism, near the cliff that US Army Rangers scaled on D-Day eighty years ago.
Aimed at bolstering support for Ukraine, Biden's address in Normandy, his second speech in as many days, is also expected to be a critique of Donald Trump's isolationist leanings as Biden faces off against Trump in the November 5 presidential election.
Biden will stage his address at Pointe du Hoc, reiterating the Republican predecessor, Ronald Reagan. He declared that democracy was "worth dying for" at his 1984 D-Day anniversary speech there, emphasizing the US commitment to peace.
According to Jake Sullivan, Biden's national security adviser, the president would establish a "through line" from World War II that would link the Cold War, NATO's founding, and Russia's ongoing conflict with Ukraine.
Sullivan said to reporters earlier this week that Biden will discuss the existential conflict between freedom and a dictatorship, and the address will be about the individuals who climbed those cliffs and how they sacrificed their personal interests for the good of the nation. According to him, Biden will also talk about the perils of isolationism and how, in the end, both America and the rest of the world suffer more when people submit to dictators and don't oppose them.
In a passionate speech on Thursday, Biden urged Western nations to support Ukraine in its conflict with Russia and called for the defense of freedom.
June 6th is D-Day anniversary, and related activities are part of Biden's presidential obligations, not a political event. However, they offer Biden an opportunity to set himself apart from Trump.
As the oldest president to hold the position at 81, Biden has attempted to allay age-related worries by emphasizing the possible influence that a second term for Trump, 77, may have.
Biden has labeled Trump as a danger to American democracy as his followers stormed the Capitol after the Republican refused to concede his defeat in the 2020 election.
In the meantime, extreme right parties are becoming more prevalent throughout Europe. On Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to place conventional missiles close to the US and its allies if they would allow Ukraine to use long-range Western weaponry to attack deeper into Russia.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, will be meeting with Biden on Friday after he visited with veterans of World War II in Normandy on Thursday.