Biden to campaign in Midwest after clinching Democratic nomination

[March 13, 2024]  By Andrea Shalal
 
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden heads to the political battleground state of Wisconsin on Wednesday after clinching the Democratic Party's nomination, where he will focus on securing the votes of suburban women, Black voters and Latinos across the Midwest.  

U.S. President Joe Biden speaks to reporters upon his return to Washington, at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, U.S., March 11, 2024, REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Biden's campaign issued a new video entitled "Let's Go" after voters in Georgia helped the 81-year old incumbent president secure the lastof the 1,968 delegates needed for the nomination, teeing up what would be the first U.S. presidential rematch in nearly 70 years.

Biden has sharpened his attacks in recent weeks on former President Donald Trump and what he called Trump's "campaign of resentment, revenge, and retribution that threatens the very idea of America."

In Milwaukee, Biden will again tout his administration's economic policies - although that strategy has failed to persuade many likely voters thus far - and open the campaign's local headquarters before moving on to Michigan on Thursday.

The visits are part of a month-long "I'm on board" blitz by Biden and top administration officials aimed at rallying supporters in each of the seven battleground states that could decide the 2024 election. In the past week, Biden has already been in Pennsylvania, Georgia and New Hampshire.

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, who campaigned in Colorado on Tuesday, visited Wisconsin last week to trumpet White House economic policies and talk about apprenticeship programs and "good-paying union jobs."

“Now, the general election truly begins, and the contrast could not be clearer," Harris said in a statement on Tuesday.

Wisconsin is a political battleground state that the Biden team wants to win in November to get to the 270 state electoral votes required to be reelected. Biden won the state of nearly six million people in 2020 by less than 1% of votes; in 2016 Wisconsin supported Republican nominee Trump.

Organizers say they expect hundreds of pro-Palestinian marchers to protest Biden's visit to Milwaukee over his response to Israel's war on Gaza, which was sparked by the Oct. 7 attack of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, that killed some 1,200 people.

More than 30,000 people in Gaza have been killed as a result of Israel's military response, according to Palestinian authorities, and the war has angered some of Biden's core group of voters, including young people and left-leaning progressives.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)

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