(CNN) President Joe Biden will visit Alabama on Sunday for the 58th anniversary The landmark Bloody Sunday anniversary The march strengthened the civil rights movement and led to the expansion of voting rights.
Biden’s stop in Selma comes as he and fellow Democrats struggle to pass their own voting rights measures, with dim prospects for passage in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.
However, Biden plans to make fresh calls for new voter protections as he speaks from the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where a group of civil rights marchers were attacked by white state troopers as they tried to cross in 1965.
The president participates in an annual walk across the bridge to commemorate the events that sparked outrage and helped rally support behind the Voting Rights Act. Among the protesters attacked was the late US Representative John Lewis.
Aside from its place in history, Selma is also still recovering The devastating typhoon that hit two months ago.
It’s not Biden’s first time attending anniversary events in Selma; In 2020, when he was running for president, he spoke at the historic Brown Chapel AME Church, where he served to court black voters ahead of Super Tuesday.
“We’ve been pulled back, we’ve lost ground. We’ve clearly seen that if you give hate it will come back,” he said in his speech.
Biden He would win the Democratic nomination and the presidency because of the support of black voters.
Vice President Kamala Harris, Yar Represented the administration On last year’s anniversary, he said in a statement Sunday that “America has witnessed a new attack on the freedom to vote.”
“Terrorists have worked to undermine voting protections that generations of citizen leaders and advocates have fought tirelessly to champion. They have removed voters from the rolls. They have closed polling stations. They have made it a crime to give water to people standing in line,” she said.
Harris vowed during last year’s event that he and Biden would “put the full power of the executive branch behind our shared effort” while criticizing Republican lawmakers for voting to block the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Voting Freedom Act. . He called on those gathered at the base of the Edmund Pettus Bridge to “continue to push the Senate not to allow an arcane provision to deny a sacred right.”
On Sunday, Biden plans to “talk about the importance of commemorating Bloody Sunday so history cannot be erased,” according to White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
“He will exemplify how the continuing struggle for voting rights was integral to providing economic justice and civil rights for black Americans,” he said.
Bloody Sunday was commemorated in 1965. 600 people started a rally from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. Discrimination in voter registration. At the Edmund Pettus Bridge, state and local lawmen attacked the marchers with billy clubs and tear gas, sending them back to Selma. Seventeen people were hospitalized and dozens were injured by police.
This story was updated Sunday with additional information.
