President Joe Biden marked the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington Monday by welcoming family members of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to the White House and declaring the nation “can’t let hate prevail” after a racially motivated shooting in Florida.
President Joe Biden marked the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington Monday by welcoming family members of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to the White House and declaring the nation “can’t let hate prevail” after a racially motivated shooting in Florida.
The meeting unfolded exactly 60 years after King met with President John F. Kennedy in the Oval Office around the original march in 1963, when King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial.
Speaking in the Roosevelt Room, Mr. Biden leaned into a simmering debate over American history curricula and acknowledged they are marking the anniversary of a watershed moment for Black Americans just days after a racist gunman shot dead three Black persons at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville.
“You can’t let hate prevail. Silence is complicity and we’re not going to remain silent,” Mr. Biden told guests who included Martin Luther King III, the oldest son of King and Coretta Scott King; his wife, Arndrea Waters King; and their daughter, Yolanda.
Bernice King, the youngest daughter of the 1960s civil rights icon, attended along with civil rights activist Rev. Al Sharpton and other Black leaders.
Mr. Biden is using the march anniversary to promote his economic vision and efforts on behalf of Black Americans, a key voting bloc for Democrats.
