Former President Barack Obama gave his first speech since the election at the Obama Foundation’s 2024 Democracy Forum on Thursday.
His speech, “On the Power of Pluralism,” was an appeal to the need for hope in the fight for democracy’s survival. Obama made it clear that while we need to forge alliances, sometimes with groups we didn’t entirely agree with, we absolutely must remember that our democracy “depends on everyone following a certain set of rules.”
To that end, the Republican Party’s actions in “actively suppressing votes or politicizing the armed forces, or using the judiciary or criminal justice system to go after opponents,” is a line in the sand.
“When that happens, we fight for what we believe in. … A line has been crossed and we have to stand up and speak out and organize and mobilize as forcefully as we can.”
“None of this will be easy,” Obama continued. “Building up these habits and practices that so often we’ve lost, learning to trust each other again, that’s a generational project.”
