Joe Biden Does Not Hold Back Shredding The GOP For Potential Social Security Cuts: ‘They Want To Rob It’

During remarks at the 2025 ACRD Conference in Chicago, IL, former President Joe Biden spoke about the GOP push to cut Social Security.

Transcript

00:00These nights, my friend Governor O'Malley knows what they're really up to. He says,

00:05and I love his quote, they want to wreck it so they can rob it. They want to wreck it so they

00:13can rob it. Why do they want to rob it? In order to deliver huge tax cuts to billionaires and big

00:21corporations and keep it going. They want to make permanent the 2017 tax cuts, which overwhelmingly

00:27benefited the wealthiest Americans and the biggest corporations. That's going to cost

00:34$5 trillion. Where are they going to get $5 trillion to pay for it rather than continue

00:42to run the deficit up? What will they always do? By winning, by running up the national debt,

00:48number one, and then by taking the money from someplace else. What are the two big pots of

00:55money out there in raw numbers? Social Security and Medicaid? Well, from other programs people

01:04rely on and have paid into. Republicans, these guys are willing to hurt the middle class and

01:10the working class in order to deliver significant greater wealth to their already very wealthy.

01:15who in the hell do they think they are? I really think they. I mean, just basic decency. Who

01:25do they think they are? I think anybody should go out, they can make a billion dollars a year,

01:33they can. Fine. Pay your fair share. You know what the average, we have a thousand billionaires

01:41in America. You know the average federal tax they pay? 8.2 percent. Anybody want to trade

01:49that number? That's your pay? Folks, look. Let me close. I'm sorry to go on so long, but

01:57it's just, anyway. I grew up in Scrant, Pennsylvania as a kid, and then Claymont, Delaware. Middle-class

02:06middle-class towns, working-class towns. Places where people worked hard all their lives

02:12with the promise that they'd be able to retire someday with a little bit of dignity. Because

02:19they've been paying in a thing called Social Security since the very paycheck they've earned.

02:25These people get knocked down every day, learn to get up. My dad's one experience when you get

02:32knocked down, just get up. Get up. They get up every day. The last thing they need from

02:41their government is deliberate cruelty. It's about people in neighborhoods across the country

02:49who look out for each other. You don't see empathy. They don't see it as a sign of weakness.

02:57They see empathy as a decent instinct. They don't see cruelty as a sign of strength.

03:09Social Security is about more than retirement accounts. It's about honoring a fundamental trust

03:15between government and people. It's about peace of mind for those who work their whole lives.