Biden: 'I’ve benefited' from being white, offers stark contrast to Trump on race
WASHINGTON – Democratic nominee Joe Biden said Thursday that he has benefited from the privileges of being white, a sentiment that differs from President Donald Trump, who has consistently denied the existence of systemic racism.
“Sure, I’ve benefited just because I don’t have to go through what my Black brothers and sisters have had to go through,” the former vice president told CNN’s Anderson Cooper during a televised town hall event in Pennsylvania.
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Biden's response came after journalist Bob Woodward released several recorded interviews with Trump, including one where the president dismissed questions about benefiting from white privilege, saying Woodward had “drank the Kool-Aid.”
"Just listen to you. Wow," Trump scoffed at Woodward. "No, I don’t feel that at all."
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Joe Biden discusses the ways in which he's benefited from White privilege.
"I've benefited just because I don't have to go through what my Black brothers and sisters have had to go through." #BidenTownHall https://t.co/OAyAC2Vg7v pic.twitter.com/H776Opsgts— CNN (@CNN) September 18, 2020
Biden also pointed to his working-class roots while trying to distance himself from the type privilege Trump has been accused of having, saying that “Guys like Trump who inherited everything and squandered what they inherited are the people that I’ve always had a problem with, not the people who are busting their neck.”
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The contrasting comments between the two candidates comes as the country has been facing a reckoning this summer over racial injustice in policing, resulting in protests and calls for reform.
Trump has followed pattern of dismissing systemic racism within various institutions of the U.S.
In July, CBS News' Catherine Herridge brought up George Floyd, a Black man who died pleading for breath earlier this year as a Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck, asking "Why are African Americans still dying at the hands of law enforcement in this country?"
"So are white people. So are white people," Trump replied. "What a terrible question to ask. So are white people. More white people, by the way. More white people."
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Recently, labeling it "divisive, anti-American propaganda," Trump also moved to halt employee training at federal agencies on topics that include "white privilege" and "critical race theory."
Thursday, Trump attacked education projects devoted to the nation's history of slavery and racial discrimination as Democrats attempting a "liberal indoctrination of America’s youth" through alternative views of the nation's history.
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Contributing: Candy Woodall USA TODAY Network Pennsylvania Capitol Bureau; The Associated Press
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Biden says at CNN town hall that he has benefited from being white
