Benjamin Chavis: Let’s Stop the Lynching of President Joe Biden

There are times in life when the convictions of the mind and personal conscience come into conflict with the prevailing popular cries for the blood, life, and end of another human being’s future existence. I refuse to be a silent witness to another lynching in America. So, the following is what I have observed and seen firsthand in the last few days of the escalating mob-like calls for President Joe Biden’s reelection in 2024. I do not represent any organization or political party. On July 4, 2024, as I sat quietly in Raleigh, North Carolina, I wrote down my personal opinions.

While I am a proud Democrat, I am deeply saddened by the cowardice and backstabbing of those who dare to publicly call for President Biden’s resignation while refusing to publicly call for former President Donald Trump to resign and end his fascist campaign to retake the White House. The question is why. The attempted political lynching of President Joe Biden has more to do with spurious political infighting than it does with any struggles during a nationally televised political debate. What are the real motivations of all those calling for President Biden’s resignation?

Some will say that my words and expressions here are too strong and controversial. This may be true, because there should be strong words and expressions that should always denounce and condemn any form of lynching. A political lynching is also a crime against the unity of our humanity. This is the situation today in America. It is the politics of division against the politics of unifying all Americans for the best interests and future of the nation that is on the ballot. Democracy is on the ballot. Justice is on the ballot. Equality is on the ballot. Fairness is on the ballot. Liberty is on the ballot.

The antidote to the current resurgence of ignorance, racism, cowardice, fascism, and the rollback of freedom, justice, equality, and fairness is to work hard every day and diligently to ensure the largest voter turnout this year in American history. Why do I claim responsibility for making this emergency declaration on July 4, 2024? African Americans, like others who fought and died in the fields and streets of the 13 American colonies during the Revolutionary War against the British Empire 248 years ago, have a birthright to the Declaration of Independence signed on July 4, 1776, and later to the Constitution of the United States of America.

Although thousands of people of African descent, who were not enslaved, enlisted and fought for freedom and independence against the British, no people of African descent were invited or allowed to attend the meetings that formed the democracy and the Constitutional Convention of the newly emerging nation that were held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1787. My great-great-great-great-grandfather, the Reverend John Chavis (1763-1838), fought as a young enlisted soldier in the Revolutionary War against the British in our home state of North Carolina and in the state of Virginia. The Chavis family has lived in Granville County, North Carolina for over 285 years. My father, Benjamin F. Chavis Sr. (1898-1965) enlisted and fought as a young sergeant major in the U.S. Army during World War I.

What matters here is that generations of African and African American soldiers have enlisted, fought, and died to defend and protect this nation and democracy for the past 248 years. And we will not allow anyone or anything to deny our birthright to freedom and democracy. For us, the right to vote in America is bloodstained and sacred. We know from lived experience the horror, pain, and suffering caused by centuries of physical lynching in America to satisfy pure fear, hatred, white supremacy, and ignorance of racism. Today, we also know that when mobs call for the downfall and political lynching of those who have been our allies in our long struggle for freedom, justice, voting rights, and fairness, we cannot remain silent.

It is ironic that here too in Raleigh, North Carolina, less than 24 hours after the so-called dodgy debate in Atlanta, Georgia, President Biden spoke eloquently and forcefully at the NC State Fair Grounds just a few miles from John Chavis Memorial Park in downtown Raleigh. President Biden said, “I know I’m not a young man, to state the obvious, I don’t walk as easily as I used to. I don’t talk as easily as I used to. I don’t debate as well as I used to. But I know what I know: I know how to tell the truth.” Truth is therapeutic. Our nation needs more truth than lies and fake news being spread.

At the same time, as calls for President Biden to resign grow louder, the United States Supreme Court has now ruled that past and future presidential “official acts” of violence, criminality, repression, voter suppression, and insurrection are all immune from prosecution as long as those acts fall within the core responsibilities of a president of the United States. This is dangerous and fundamentally contrary to the meaning and principles of democracy. That is why now, more than ever, we must raise our voices and mobilize our families and communities to turn out to vote in record numbers in swing states and in every other state across the country. We all have work to do. We said in the civil rights movement of the 1960s, “When the going gets tough in our fight for freedom, we must get tougher.”

Join me and make your voice heard with me. Let’s vote in record numbers across America. Let’s stop the lynching of President Joe Biden.