With 2024 underway, it's crunch time for presidential candidates. Primary season begins this month, and while President Joe Biden has no serious challengers on the Democratic side, he is ramping up his reelection campaign with a speech near the Valley Forge historical site.
The speech initially was scheduled for Saturday – the third anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. But his campaign moved it to Friday due to the winter storm that's expected to hit the Philadelphia area this weekend.
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The event will take place at Montgomery Community College at 3:15 p.m., about 12 miles from Valley Forge National Historical Park. The location was chosen for its national significance.
Valley Forge is "where George Washington united American willpower and went on to lead this nation as commander and as president – before relinquishing power – the ultimate precedent and the experiment of American democracy," Quentin Fulks, Biden's principal deputy campaign manager, told ABC News.
According to the Biden campaign, the speech will heavily contrast Biden with former President Donald Trump, who is leading the polls for the Republican nomination by a wide margin. Biden's address is expected to paint Trump and his allies as threats to democracy and freedom – a core message of the Biden campaign.
Pennsylvania is considered a battleground state in presidential elections, though it has supported the Democratic candidate in seven of the last eight presidential elections. Biden, who grew up in Scranton, won Pennsylvania by a 1.17% margin in 2020, clinching the presidency. In 2016, Trump beat Hillary Clinton by an even smaller margin – 0.72%.
Biden will follow his Pennsylvania visit with a trip to Charleston, South Carolina on Monday. Meanwhile, Trump will be campaigning in Iowa on Saturday. Iowa's Republican caucuses begin Jan. 15.