President Biden speaks to Buffalo community: ‘Evil will not win, I promise you’

At Delavan-Grider Community Center on Tuesday, President Biden spoke to the grieving Buffalo community three days after a racially motivated shooting that killed 10 and injured three others.

“Jill and I have come to stand with you. To the families, we’ve come to grieve with you,” Biden said. “It’s not the same, but we know a little bit of what it’s like to lose a piece of your soul. You feel like there’s a black hole in your chest, you’re getting sucked into and it’s hard to breathe.”

Biden, whose son Beau died of brain cancer in 2015, spoke on his own experience with the loss of a family member.

“The anger, the pain, the depth of the loss that’s so profound we know it’s hard to believe, from our personal experience and many others who we’ve met, the day’s going to come where the loved one will bring a smile as you remember him or her, a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eye. My prayer is that time comes sooner or later, but we pray that it does come,” Biden said [TIME].

After visiting the outdoor memorial by the Tops Markets on Jefferson Avenue, Biden’s motorcade arrived at Delavan-Grider where more than 100 people were in attendance, with more gathered outside the building.

The president condemned white supremacy, an ideology he called “destructive” and “evil.” He added, “White supremacy is a poison, it’s a poison. It’s been allowed to fester and grow right before our eyes. No more, no more. In America, evil will not win, I promise you. Hate will not prevail and white supremacy will not have the last word.”

“We need to say as clearly and forcefully as we can, the ideology of white supremacy has no place in America,” Biden said. “Silence is complicity, we cannot remain silent. Venom and violence cannot be the story of our time. The hateful minority, we can’t allow them to destroy America, the real America, the soul of the nation.”

Biden touched on memories of all 10 murder victims from the shooting, identifying them by name and citing their professions and hobbies and strengths, while also mentioning those injured. He also stressed that assault weapons must be kept off the streets.

Gov. Kathy Hochul spoke first, describing the emotions in Buffalo and explaining her exchange with Biden that led to his visit. “This is raw still, our hearts are still broken in two,” Hochul said. “There’s still part of our broken heart that’s filled with anger.”

“When he called me not long after this shooting, President Biden said, ‘What can I do?’ ” I said, ” ‘Mr. President, Buffalo is a little bit bigger than Scranton – when you get knocked down a little bit and don’t get the respect like the other parts of your state do, you need a little attention. If you came to Buffalo and just came and showed up and gave a collective hug … there’s something called ‘Buffalove,’ the combination of Buffalo and love.”

Hochul later advocated for a national gun policy and suggested what’s necessary to thwart a future mass shooting. “This should stimulate a national conversation about how to make sure we can do everything we can to eradicate this evil and send it back from under the rock from which it came,” she said.

Rep. Brian Higgins followed Hochul, emphasizing Buffalo’s strengths. “Buffalo is a tough place,” he said. “It’s resilient, it’s overcome adversity in many circumstances. We’ve never had such terror exacted on this community in the entire history of this community. What we can do all of this is learn – they say to live is to suffer, and to live is to give meaning to suffering” [The Buffalo News].