First lady Jill Biden launches veteran, military family initiative

First Lady Jill Biden on Monday is kicking off a new initiative aimed at boosting outreach among veterans and military families in an effort to boost her husband’s reelection bid.

Dr. Biden is celebrating the launch of Veterans and Military Families for Biden-Harris with a one-day, three-state swing through Florida, North Carolina and Georgia — three states with large populations of veterans and military families, as well as three battlegrounds that could propel President Joe Biden to victory in November over former President Donald Trump.

News of the first lady’s barnstorming campaign trip comes amid calls from some Democrats for her husband to step aside as the party’s nominee after his shaky performance in last week’s presidential debate. President Biden has repeatedly insisted that he is staying in the race, most recently on Monday when he sent a letter to Democrats in Congress that he is “firmly committed to staying in the race” and called for the recent intraparty drama “to end.”

Dr. Biden — whose father was a Navy signalman in World War II — will travel to Wilmington, North Carolina, Tampa, Florida, and Columbus, Georgia, on Monday, the campaign said. The campaign also said it will hold events in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Las Vegas and Reno, Nevada, Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona, Nashua, New Hampshire, and Erie, Harrisburg and Pittston, Pennsylvania.

“Our veterans and military families are the brave and the bold—who step forward for all of us,” Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement. “They deserve a commander in chief who respects their bravery and understands personally their sacrifice—not one who denigrates them for being willing to put their lives on the line for our democracy.”

Rodriguez’s swipe at the president refers to reports that Trump repeatedly insulted wounded veterans, dead American soldiers who fought in World War I and U.S. service members killed in Afghanistan and Iraq. John Kelly, who served in Trump’s administration as his chief of staff, confirmed in an interview last year a report from The Atlantic that Trump in 2018 did not want to visit the graves of American soldiers buried in France because they were “losers.” Trump has repeatedly denied making those remarks.

Biden’s campaign highlighted a number of pro-military and veteran initiatives that the Democratic president has undertaken during his first term, including signing into law the PACT Act, a landmark law that expands toxic exposure benefits for veterans, as well as efforts to reduce veteran homelessness and expanding VA health care eligibility.

Rodriguez said that the new initiative — which the campaign said “will engage and mobilize millions of veterans and military families across the country through battleground state events, relational organizing and online engagement” — will help contrast the records of Biden and Trump when it comes to fighting for members of the military and veterans.

“Donald Trump has no respect for our men and women in uniform, their families, or the freedoms many of them fought to defend, calling fallen soldiers suckers and losers,” she said. “Joe Biden is a military father who understands the importance of fighting for veterans every day to earn their support at the ballot box.”