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Joe Biden steps aside · The Front

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  Speaker 1: You can listen to the front on your smart sneaker
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  Speaker 1: every morning to hear the latest episode. Just say play
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  Speaker 1: the news from the Australian. From the Australian, I'm Claire Harvey.
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  Speaker 1: It's Monday, July twenty two. Joe Biden has finally announced
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  Speaker 1: the news an increasingly panicky Democratic Party has been hoping for.
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  Speaker 1: He will step aside from his candidacy for the twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty four presidential election. Now the Democrats must choose a
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  Speaker 1: new candidate, with Vice President Kamala Harris likely dick and
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  Speaker 1: test the nomination with rivals including state governors Gretchen Whitmer
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  Speaker 1: and Gavin Newsom. In a statement released early on Monday
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  Speaker 1: morning Australian Time, Biden heralded his administration's achievements, including in healthcare,
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  Speaker 1: climate action, and the treatment of veterans. Biden wrote, it
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  Speaker 1: has been the greatest honor of my life to serve
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  Speaker 1: as your president, and while it has been my intention
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  Speaker 1: to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best
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  Speaker 1: interests of my party and the country for me to
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  Speaker 1: stand down and to focus solely on my duties as
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  Speaker 1: president for the remainder of my term. The president continued,
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  Speaker 1: I believe today what I always have, that there is
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  Speaker 1: nothing America can't do when we do it together. We
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  Speaker 1: just have to remember we are the United States of America.
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  Speaker 1: Biden said he would address the nation later this week.
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  Speaker 1: The very Ladest News is live right now at the
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  Speaker 1: Australian dot com au. But today on the front we're
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  Speaker 1: revisiting the remarkable drama, tragedy and triumph in the life
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  Speaker 1: of Joseph Robinette Biden Junior, the forty sixth President of
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  Speaker 1: the United States. It's the end of the political road
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  Speaker 1: on his terms for a man whose political career has
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  Speaker 1: stretched over five decades and taken him from Scranton, Pennsylvania
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  Speaker 1: to the White House. For a long time, Joe Biden
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  Speaker 1: was considered too young.
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  Speaker 2: The boys looking father of three young children, was celebrating
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  Speaker 2: his thirtieth birthdays. That makes him just old enough to
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  Speaker 2: be a United States Senator, thirty being the minimum age
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  Speaker 2: prescride by the Constitution in Washington. To date, he was
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  Speaker 2: having trouble convincing some people he really is a senator
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  Speaker 2: and having some doubts.
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  Speaker 1: About Joe Biden was a twenty nine year old lawyer
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  Speaker 1: when he became one of the youngest Americans to ever
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  Speaker 1: be elected to the US Senate in nineteen seventy two.
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  Speaker 1: His political experience before that was a couple of years
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  Speaker 1: on the local council in his new home state of Delaware,
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  Speaker 1: and being junior and senior class president at high school.
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  Speaker 1: He was charming and smooth, but he had not always
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  Speaker 1: been confident. Joe Biden grew up with a stutter. He
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  Speaker 1: was ridiculed for the speech impediment by his teachers and peers,
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  Speaker 1: but Biden credits that stutter with shaping his fortune.
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  Speaker 3: I learned so much from having to deal with stuttering.
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  Speaker 3: It gave me insight into other people's pain, other people suffered.
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  Speaker 3: It made me understand that everyone everyone has something they're
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  Speaker 3: fighting to overcome.
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  Speaker 1: Biden's political career stretched fifty two years. During that time,
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  Speaker 1: he endured shattering personal tragedy. Shortly after Joe Biden turned thirty,
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  Speaker 1: his wife and children were involved in a car crash
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  Speaker 1: while Christmas shopping. This is Biden talking about that moment
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  Speaker 1: some forty years later.
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  Speaker 4: My wife was.
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  Speaker 3: Dead, my daughter was dead, and I wasn't sure how
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  Speaker 3: my sons were going to make it. For the first
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  Speaker 3: time in my life, I understood how someone could consciously
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  Speaker 3: decide to commit suicide, not because they were deranged, not
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  Speaker 3: because they were notts because they've been at the top
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  Speaker 3: of the mountain and they just knew in their heart
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  Speaker 3: they never get there again.
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  Speaker 1: Biden suddenly found himself a single father to his young sons,
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  Speaker 1: Bo and Hunter. The grief was immense, but Biden's political
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  Speaker 1: career did not slow down. He was elected to the
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  Speaker 1: Senate seven consecutive times. He ran for the Democratic presidential
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  Speaker 1: nomination in nineteen eighty eight and again in two thousand
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  Speaker 1: and eight, before becoming Vice president under Barack Obama. In
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  Speaker 1: twenty fifteen, tragedy struck the Biden family again.
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  Speaker 5: Believing the political world Tonight is mourning the death of
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  Speaker 5: Bo Biden, the son of Vice President Joe Biden, who
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  Speaker 5: succumbed to brain cancer Saturday at the age of forty six.
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  Speaker 5: He was a promising young politician, but his death highlights
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  Speaker 5: both the dangers of brain cancer and the tragedies that
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  Speaker 5: too often have befallen the Biden family.
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  Speaker 1: Joe Biden now had only one living child from his
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  Speaker 1: first marriage, Hunter Biden, a son whom he loved but
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  Speaker 1: who would become an enormous political liability.
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  Speaker 6: Guilty on all counts. That is the verdict in the
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  Speaker 6: gun trial of Hunter Biden, the President's son. Hunter Biden
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  Speaker 6: is now convicted of all three felony charges related to
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  Speaker 6: the purchase of a revolver in twenty eighteen while being
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  Speaker 6: an addict.
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  Speaker 1: Scandal after scandal finally culminated in June twenty twenty four,
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  Speaker 1: Hunter Biden was convicted for lying about his illegal drug
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  Speaker 1: use in order to buy a gun some years earlier.
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  Speaker 1: He was the first child of a sitting US president
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  Speaker 1: to be convicted of a crime. But despite Hunter Biden's
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  Speaker 1: many controversies and concerns about Joe Biden's age, in twenty twenty,
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  Speaker 1: Joe became the President of the United States after winning
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  Speaker 1: a bitter campaign against Donald Trump. In his twenty twenty
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  Speaker 1: victory speech, Biden sounds, even at seventy seven, relatively youthful
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  Speaker 1: and dynamic.
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  Speaker 4: I'm proud of the coalestion. We put together the broadest
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  Speaker 4: and most diverse coalation in history. Democrats, Republicans, Independents, progress as, moderates, Conservatives, young, old, urban, suburban, rural, gay, straight, transgender, weight, Latino, Asian,
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  Speaker 4: Native American.
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  Speaker 3: I mean it, especially those moments, and.
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  Speaker 4: Especially those moments with his campaign was that lowest down
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  Speaker 4: the African American community stood up again for Amay bad
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  Speaker 4: and I have your.
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  Speaker 1: As a politician, Biden can be difficult to ideologically pin down.
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  Speaker 1: In a nineteen seventy four profile, Biden rejected the idea
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  Speaker 1: he was a progressive liberal. We've used an ai voice
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  Speaker 1: to read his words from nineteen seventy four.
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  Speaker 7: When it comes to issues like abortion, amnesty, and acid,
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  Speaker 7: I'm about as liberal as your grandmother.
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  Speaker 1: On the topic of abortion, Biden was particularly vehement. The
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  Speaker 1: Supreme Court's landmark Roe versus Wade decision had been announced
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  Speaker 1: just the year before. Biden, who's a Catholic, did not
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  Speaker 1: agree with the finding.
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  Speaker 7: I don't like the Supreme Court decision on abortion. I
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  Speaker 7: think it went too far. I don't think that a
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  Speaker 7: woman has the soul right to say what should happen
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  Speaker 7: to her body.
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  Speaker 1: The accepted wisdom is that people become more conservative as
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  Speaker 1: they age. In Biden's case, the opposite appears to be true.
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  Speaker 1: Biden said in his twenty twenty presidential campaign he would
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  Speaker 1: look to decriminalize marijuana at a federal level. He also
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  Speaker 1: said people should not be behind bars on charges of
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  Speaker 1: simple possession or small scale use. While marijuana was not
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  Speaker 1: decriminalized in his term, there have been at least two
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  Speaker 1: rounds of mass pardons for people with federal possession convictions.
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  Speaker 1: But it's the politically divisive topic of abortion on which
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  Speaker 1: Biden has softened the most.
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  Speaker 4: But a few of the American people send me at
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  Speaker 4: Congress of supports the right to choose. I promise you
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  Speaker 4: I'll restore Roby Wade as the law of the land again.
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  Speaker 1: Reproductive rights were at the center of Biden's twenty twenty
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  Speaker 1: four re election campaign. He positioned himself as the only
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  Speaker 1: man standing between women and nationwide abortion bands. So where
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  Speaker 1: did it go wrong for Joe Biden? Up next his
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  Speaker 1: decline in popularity and questions on his mental acuity. We'll
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  Speaker 1: be back after this break. When Joe Biden took office
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  Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one, he faced an immense task.
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  Speaker 4: Today we celebrate the triumph not of a candidate, but
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  Speaker 4: of a cause, the cause of democracy.
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  Speaker 1: Biden positioned himself as a unifier. Former President Trump called
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  Speaker 1: the election stolen. When Biden came to office, COVID was
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  Speaker 1: still raging and the economic situation was dire. Mass layoffs
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  Speaker 1: meant to unemployed Omen was at six point three percent,
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  Speaker 1: and food banks were feeding millions.
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  Speaker 8: San Antonio Food Bank in Texas. The food bank serves
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  Speaker 8: eight semi truck loads of food to people in need
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  Speaker 8: every day. They say the numbers are so high they
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  Speaker 8: have to ration food.
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  Speaker 1: Biden signed a one point nine trillion dollar stimulus package
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  Speaker 1: in March twenty twenty one, and the first twinges of
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  Speaker 1: inflation were felt worldwide. A few months later, for the
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  Speaker 1: first time, Biden's popularity took a serious hit. His popularity
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  Speaker 1: was tested again when he withdrew troops from Afghanistan in
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  Speaker 1: August twenty twenty one. The Taliban took over almost immediately
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  Speaker 1: as people scrambled to evacuate. A bomb at Kabul Airport
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  Speaker 1: killed thirteen American troops and nearly two hundred Afghans. Many
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  Speaker 1: said this was an avoidable tragedy. Biden's popularity might have
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  Speaker 1: had time to recover had there not been more economic
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  Speaker 1: strain to come. In February twenty twenty two, Russia invaded
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  Speaker 1: Ukraine and the costs of energy and shipping went up.
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  Speaker 1: By June, prices in America had increased by more than
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  Speaker 1: nine percent. The steepest rise in four decades. Economists predicted
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  Speaker 1: a recession, and it didn't eventuate for America, but the
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  Speaker 1: cost of living pressures continued to hit, but more than
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  Speaker 1: the economy and more than the withdrawal of troops. It
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  Speaker 1: was this moment which derailed Biden's re election campaign.
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  Speaker 4: When I'm in a fix the taxis for example, we
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  Speaker 4: had one thousand tillionaires in America, but a billionaires ann
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  Speaker 4: and what's happening.
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  Speaker 1: The first presidential debate, Biden gave a performance so disastrous
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  Speaker 1: it may be the only thing some Americans remember.
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  Speaker 4: About him dealing with everything we have to do with.
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  Speaker 3: Look if we finally beat medicare.
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  Speaker 7: Thank you President Biden.
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  Speaker 8: President Trump, he's ready.
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  Speaker 5: He did beat Medicare, he beat it to death, and
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  Speaker 5: he's destroying medicare because all of these people are coming in.
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  Speaker 1: The reaction was swift and severe. This was Democrat's worst nightmare.
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  Speaker 5: Just a day for mister Biden's to beat performance sparks
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  Speaker 5: concerns about his age.
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  Speaker 4: Donald Trump emerged as the winner of the debate, where
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  Speaker 4: he was saying more nimble and discipline compared to twenty twenty.
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  Speaker 1: Y cannot be real life.
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  Speaker 9: It just can't where America god.
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  Speaker 1: Biden compounded his mistake by introducing Ukrainian President Volodim Zelenski
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  Speaker 1: as President Putin.
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  Speaker 4: And now I want to hand it over to the
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  Speaker 4: President of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he
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  Speaker 4: has determination. Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin, President prudent, You've
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  Speaker 4: got beat President Pusin.
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  Speaker 1: President Lynskin.
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  Speaker 4: I'm so focused on beating Putin. We gotta worry about
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  Speaker 4: it anyway.
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  Speaker 1: He then referred to Kamala Harris as vice President Trump.
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  Speaker 1: At a news conference. Senior Democrats, movie stars, and millionaires
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  Speaker 1: began publicly calling for Biden to step down. Former President Trump,
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  Speaker 1: whose victory already seemed inevitable, then narrowly avoided an assassination attempt.
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  Speaker 2: What happened.
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  Speaker 5: Former President Donald Trump was rushed off a stage during
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  Speaker 5: a Pennsylvania rally. Pops and bangs were heard.
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  Speaker 6: The Secret Service quickly moved to protect the former president.
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  Speaker 1: We've all seen that photo. Trump being whisked away by security,
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  Speaker 1: fist in the air, ear bleeding, and the American flag
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  Speaker 1: billowing behind him. Trump was staunch on the fire and
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  Speaker 1: was greeted as a hero at the Republican Convention.
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  Speaker 9: We are here tonight in one purpose, and that is
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  Speaker 9: to elect Donald J. Trump as the next president of
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  Speaker 9: the United States. He is here tonight to show his courage.
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  Speaker 9: He defiant say yet, somebody who tried to kill him,
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  Speaker 9: you will not take this man down. He has the courage,
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  Speaker 9: the strength, and he will be the next president of
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  Speaker 9: the United States.
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  Speaker 1: Biden came down with COVID and had to take a
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  Speaker 1: week off the campaign trail, as colleagues begged the man
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  Speaker 1: once too young, now unequivocally too old to perform one
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  Speaker 1: Larne lost active service for his country and step aside.
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  Speaker 1: Now the Democrats challenge is to seize this moment and
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  Speaker 1: try to stop the flow of momentum from sweeping Donald
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  Speaker 1: Trump and the Republicans back to the White House. This
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  Speaker 1: story is moving fast and you can get across the
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  Speaker 1: latest right now at the Australian dot com dot au