In a video message published on Independence Day , President Donald Trump declared that the United States “will be greater than ever before,” Fox News reported.
“I just want to wish everybody a really happy Fourth of July,” the president began.
“We’re on the way to a tremendous victory, it’s going to happen and it’s going to happen big, our country will be greater than ever before.”
In the brief video message, Trump focused on his administration’s accomplishments with regard to the economy, describing the novel coronavirus as a “plague.”
“We were doing better than any country had ever done in history and not just us, any country, and then we got hit with this terrible plague from China,” the president stated.
Trump added that the United States is now “coming back,” with “spectacular” jobs numbers.
Both Trump and his allies have long blamed China for the coronavirus pandemic. Most recently, White House trade advisor Peter Navarro alleged that China’s ruling Communist Party created and deliberately spread the virus across the world.
Other Trump allies — such as Senators Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Ted Cruz of Texas — have called for a more aggressive approach to China, proposing sanctions and similar measures.
As Fox News noted, Trump’s video message came less than 24 hours after his address at Mount Rushmore. During his Friday speech at Mount Rushmore, the commander-in-chief attacked the American left, saying that “Judeo-Christian principles” need to be defended.
The New York Times described Trump’s speech as “dark and divisive,” pointing out that he barely mentioned the public health crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, choosing to focus on slamming his political opponents.
On Friday, Trump also announced his plan to build a park with “the statues of the greatest Americans to ever live,” which was seen as an attempt to push back against the demands to remove monuments associated with white supremacy and colonialism.
The Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee Joe Biden released a message of his own. In the video, the former vice president discussed the civil rights movement, invoking the names of Martin Luther King Jr. and George Floyd.
Biden focused on racial justice, arguing that the country is finally ready to live up to its ideals. Biden did not mention Trump during his address, but he criticized the president in a scathing opinion piece for NBC News .
In the column, the former vice president vowed to overturn Trump’s signature policies and strengthen the Voting Rights act.