The Democratic president said in the call that the 2017 “Unite the Right” white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, made him decide that he should run for president.
The rally followed months of protests over the city’s plan to remove a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. Hundreds of white nationalists traveled to Charlottesville in August 2017, with some marching on the University of Virginia campus carrying torches and chanting “Jews will not replace us!”
Trump, who was president at the time, was criticized for initially saying there were “fine people on both sides” after the rally devolved into violent clashes.
“That is when I decided I had to stay engaged instead of walking away,” Biden said in the call on Thursday, quoting Trump’s remarks from then. The president added: “Silence is complicity.”