During an address the nation on Saturday night, Joe Biden pledged to be a president “who seeks not to divide but to unify.”
Biden delivered his first remarks as president-elect at a victory party in Wilmington, after he was officially declared the winner of the presidential election on Saturday. Biden jogged onto the stage wearing a black suit, black mask and light blue tie. He pointed and waved at the screaming crowd gathered to hear him speak.
His presidential campaign announced that Biden and his wife, Jill, and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff will appear at a drive-in rally outside the convention center in Wilmington, Delaware.
Echoing his campaign stump speech, Biden promised to be a president who “doesn’t see red states or blue states, only sees the United States,” and said he would work “with all my heart” to win the confidence of all Americans.
Biden touted the fact that he’s won more votes than any presidential ticket in history, calling his win “a convincing victory, a victory for the people.” He also said he was “surprised” by seeing the celebrations and an “outpouring of joy” in the wake of his win nationwide.
Biden said that “once again, America’s bent the arc of the moral universe more toward justice.”
Biden will unveil a group of scientists and experts to help him craft a plan to tackle the coronavirus pandemic on Monday.
The president-elect said the plan would be “built on bedrock science” and “constructed out of compassion, empathy and concern.” Biden made Trump’s mishandling of the pandemic a central focus of his campaign and pledged that his top priority as president would be managing the virus.
Biden said that “our work begins with getting COVID under control”, adding Americans “cannot repair the economy, restore our economy or relish life’s most precious moments” without doing so.
Vice president-elect Kamala Harris said voters have “ushered in a new day for America.”
Harris said voters chose hope, unity, decency, science and truth in choosing she and Biden over Trump.
Harris, the first woman to be elected vice president, wore a white pantsuit in tribute to women’s suffrage. She also opened her remarks with a tribute to the late Georgia Congressman John Lewis, a Civil Rights icon, who said democracy is not a state but an act. Harris will also be the first Black woman to serve as vice president.
Harris noted her ascension to the role comes 100 years after the 19th Amendment was ratified and 55 years after the signing of the Voting Rights Act, which expanded who could participate in American democracy.
She praised Joe Biden for having “the audacity to break one of the most substantial barriers that exist in our country” by selecting a woman as his running mate.
“Every little girl watching tonight sees that this is a county of possibilities,” Harris said.