“I do know they really feel like there’s a black gap of their chest they’re being sucked into, and issues won't ever get higher,” he mentioned. “Ho
“I do know they really feel like there’s a black gap of their chest they’re being sucked into, and issues won’t ever get higher,” he mentioned. “However our prayers are with you. And I guarantee you, the one you misplaced will at all times be with you, at all times be with you.”
The president’s capacity to venture empathy towards those that are struggling stands in distinction to Mr. Trump, who struggled to convey a way of somber help at such moments. (His grinning, thumbs-up {photograph} at a hospital after a mass capturing in El Paso generated a backlash of indignant commentary about his go to.) Throughout a marketing campaign performed out towards a backdrop of grief due to the pandemic, Mr. Biden typically accused his opponent of getting no actual empathy for many who have been struggling.
Mr. Biden additionally accused his predecessor of embracing and fomenting the very racial strife that has roiled the nation and impressed acts of violence just like the one which erupted throughout Atlanta on Tuesday. It was Mr. Trump’s response to racist violence in 2017 in Charlottesville, Va. — and particularly his remark about “good folks” among the many white supremacist rioters — that motivated him to run for president, Mr. Biden has typically mentioned.
Moments of mourning after mass shootings is usually a particular problem for any president. They require the power to consolation those that are grieving the lack of their family members whereas on the similar time providing optimism and hope to a nation that’s typically badly shaken by the horror of what has simply occurred.
In 2012, after 20 younger kids have been killed by a gunman in Newtown, Conn., President Barack Obama concluded remarks at a memorial service by slowly studying their names, one after the other, whereas some within the viewers wept.
Three years later, after ending his eulogy for the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, who was gunned down together with eight others throughout a Bible examine in a Charleston, S.C., church, Mr. Obama sang a few of “Superb Grace,” bringing the church to its toes and touching the center of the nation.
Very like that second, Mr. Biden now faces not solely a grotesque killing spree, however an episode wrapped in racial tensions. And like throughout Mr. Obama’s tenure, the phrases of empathy will likely be adopted by powerful questions on what the federal authorities can or ought to do to forestall the tragic scene from being repeated once more.
Sabrina Tavernise contributed reporting from Atlanta.