Biden tells Morehouse graduates he hears their voices protesting Gaza war

ATLANTA — President Joe Biden told Morehouse College graduates Sunday that he has heard their voices of protest against the war between Israel and Hamas and that the scenes of the conflict in Gaza have been heartbreaking.

“I support peaceful, nonviolent protests,” he told the students, some of whom wore keffiyehs around their shoulders over their black graduation gowns. “Your voices need to be heard, and I promise I will hear them.”

The president told the crowd that it was a “humanitarian crisis in Gaza, which is why I called for an immediate ceasefire to end the fighting” and bring the hostages home taken when Hamas attacked Israel on October 7. Toward the end of his speech, which also reflected on American democracy and his role in safeguarding it, was the most direct acknowledgment to American students of the campus protests that swept the country.

Morehouse’s announcement that Biden would be the commencement speaker sparked backlash among faculty and supporters at the school who oppose Biden’s handling of the war. Some Morehouse alumni circulated a letter online condemning school administrators for inviting Biden and soliciting signatures to pressure Morehouse President David Thomas to rescind it.

The letter claimed that Biden’s approach to Israel amounted to support for genocide in Gaza and was out of step with the pacifism expressed by Martin Luther King Jr., Morehouse’s most famous graduate.

Hamas attack on southern Israel killed 1,200 people. The Israeli offensive has killed more than 35,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to local health authorities.

Some graduates showed their support for Palestinians in Gaza by tying kaffiyehs around their shoulders over their black graduation gowns. A student wrapped himself in a Palestinian flag. On the stage behind the president, academics unfurled a flag of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The country is mired in an ongoing civil war that has plunged it into violence and displaced millions of people. Many racial justice advocates have called for greater attention to the conflict and more U.S. attention to the conflict as well as U.S. assistance to end the violence.

“Thank you God for this ‘awakened’ class of 2024 that is in tune with the zeitgeist, the spirit of the times,” the Rev. Claybon Lea Jr. said in a prayer at the start of the school year.

Valedictorian DeAngelo Jeremiah Fletcher said at the end of his speech that it was his duty to speak out about the war in Gaza and that it was important to recognize that Palestinians and Israelis have suffered.

“From the comfort of our homes, we watch as unprecedented numbers of civilians mourn the loss of men, women and children, while calling for the release of all hostages,” he said. “My position as a Morehouse man, indeed as a human being, is to call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. »

Biden sat up and shook his hand after Fletcher finished.

The speech, along with a separate speech Biden will deliver later Sunday in the Midwest, are part of a wave of outreach to black voters by the president, who has seen his support among those voters weaken since their strong support helped him get into the Oval Office. in 2020.

After speaking at Morehouse in Atlanta, Biden will travel to Detroit to speak at an NAACP dinner.

Georgia and Michigan are among a handful of states that will help decide the expected November rematch between Biden and former Republican President Donald Trump. Biden narrowly won Georgia and Michigan in 2020 and needs to repeat — with strong Black voter turnout in both cities.

Biden spent the end of last week reaching out to Black voters. He met with plaintiffs and relatives of those involved in Brown v. Board of Education, the landmark 1954 Supreme Court decision that outlawed racial segregation in public schools. He also met with members of the “Divine Nine” black fraternities and sororities and spoke with members of the Little Rock Nine, who helped integrate a public school in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957.

In Detroit, Biden was scheduled to tour a Black-owned small business before delivering the keynote address at the NAACP’s Freedom Fund dinner, which traditionally draws thousands of attendees. The speech gives Biden a chance to reach thousands of people in Wayne County, an area that has historically voted overwhelmingly Democratic but has shown signs of resistance to his re-election bid.

Wayne County is also home to one of the largest Arab American populations in the country, primarily in the city of Dearborn. That state’s leaders were at the forefront of an “uncommitted” effort that garnered more than 100,000 votes in the state’s Democratic primary and spread across the country.

A protest rally and march against Biden’s visit is planned for Sunday afternoon in Dearborn. Another protest rally is expected later in the evening in front of Huntington Place, the venue of the dinner.

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Associated Press writer Joey Cappelletti in Lansing, Michigan, contributed to this report.

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This story has been corrected to reflect that Rev. Lea’s first name is Claybon, not Clyburn.