Joe Biden says Capitol riot was a day ‘we nearly lost America’

The speech, the president’s first political event of the election year, was intended to clarify the expected choice for US voters this autumn.

President Joe Biden speaks at a campaign event at Montgomery County Community College in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania (Stephanie Scarbrough/AP)

President Joe Biden warned on Friday that Donald Trump’s efforts to retake the White House in 2024 pose a grave threat to the country, the day before the third anniversary of the violent riot at the US Capitol by then-president Trump’s supporters aiming to keep him in power.

Speaking near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, where George Washington and the Continental Army spent a bleak winter nearly 250 years ago, Mr Biden said that January 6 2021 marked a moment where “we nearly lost America — lost it all”.