President Donald Trump used his Independence Day eve address at Mount Rushmore to warn that communism poses what he described as the greatest threat the United States has ever confronted.
Speaking to supporters gathered in South Dakota’s Black Hills, Trump said the danger exceeds the challenges of the two world wars, Pearl Harbor and the September 11 attacks.
Speaking ahead of the 250th anniversary of American independence, Trump portrayed communism as a direct threat to American freedom and cautioned that a renewed communist movement was emerging within the country.
The president presented the issue in stark moral and patriotic terms, telling the crowd, “You can be a communist, or you can be a patriot. You cannot be both.”
Trump vowed that the United States would reject communism and preserve its national identity, declaring, “We resolve and swear for all to hear that the citizens of the United States of America will vanquish communism quickly.”
The president said communism had claimed 100 million lives over the past century and caused more death and destruction than any political system ever attempted. He described the ideology as an enemy of free people around the world and a threat to the U.S. Constitution.
Turning to domestic politics, Trump told the crowd that Republicans could lose the upcoming midterm elections only if they allowed it to happen. He also called for ending the Senate filibuster, the rule that enables a minority of senators to block legislation.
Trump argued that eliminating the filibuster would allow lawmakers to pass the Save America Act, saying Republicans would not lose an election for the next century if the measure were enacted.
The president also criticized the Democratic Party, saying it was composed of illegal immigrants, criminals and people unwilling to work. He accused those who teach children that America was built on stolen land or that its heroes were oppressors of spreading Marxist lies and undermining the nation’s future.
Trump said that, as it reaches 250 years of independence, America remains the oldest republic on Earth and the most successful nation in history.
He also claimed that recent years had brought efforts to reshape the American character and separate citizens from their own history. He said American freedom could not survive without American culture.
On foreign policy, Trump said the United States had defeated Venezuela in one day and “knocked the hell out of Iran,” adding that Tehran wanted to settle. He also referred to the body of water off the southern U.S. coast as the Gulf of America, the name adopted by his administration for the Gulf of Mexico.
Trump concluded by saying the anniversary marked the start of a new golden age for the United States. He pledged that the country would become bigger, better and stronger than ever before.
