Biden Warns Nation of Rising Oligarchy

“Today an oligarchy is taking shape in America — of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, a fair shot for everyone to get ahead.”

— President Biden warned Americans of a “dangerous concentration of power” in the hands of a “very few ultra-wealthy people” and the impact he feared it would have on the country’s democracy as he delivered a farewell address Wednesday from the Oval Office, Bloomberg reports.

Biden Warns Americans Not to Forget, Ignore or Rewrite Jan. 6, 2021

“To tell us we didn’t see what we all saw with our own eyes. To dismiss concerns about it as some kind of partisan obsession. To explain it away as a protest that just got out of hand. This is not what happened.”

— President Biden, writing in the Washington Post, warned Americans not to forget the violent attack that took place at the Capitol four years ago, and he accused President-elect Donald Trump and his supporters of trying “to rewrite — even erase — the history of that day.”

Biden Commutes Death Sentences of 37 Convicted Murderers

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President Biden on Monday commuted the sentences of nearly all prisoners on federal death row, sparing the lives of 37 men just a month before Donald J. Trump will return to the Oval Office with a promise to restart federal executions, the New York Times reports. Those affected by Mr. Biden’s action, all of whom were convicted of murder, will serve life imprisonment without the possibility of parole instead of facing execution. Only three men, who each carried out notorious mass killings, will remain on federal death row.

Biden Criticizes Trump’s Tax, Tariff Plans

“By all accounts, the incoming administration is determined to return the country to another round of trickle-down economics. On top of that, he seems determined to impose steep, universal tariffs on all important goods brought into this country on the mistaken belief that foreign countries will bear the cost of those tariffs, rather than the American consumer.”

— “President Joe Biden on Tuesday took direct aim at President-elect Donald Trump’s economic agenda, denigrating his plan to impose sweeping tariffs and cut taxes as a ‘major mistake’ that will weaken the economy,” Politico reports.