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Joe Biden calls Trump the country's 'first' racist president

Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden
Posted at 10:23 AM, Jul 23, 2020
and last updated 2020-07-23 10:23:17-04

WASHINGTON (AP) — Joe Biden has said during a virtual town hall that President Donald Trump was the country's “first” racist president.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee’s comment came Wednesday in response to a questioner mentioning the president referring to the coronavirus as the “China virus." Biden said, "We’ve had racists, and they’ve existed. They’ve tried to get elected president.

He’s the first one that has.” But many presidents — including the nation’s first, George Washington — owned slaves. Trump responded by saying that he'd done more for Black Americans than any other president, with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln.