FILE PHOTO: Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden speaks during the 11th Democratic candidates debate of the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign, held in CNN’s Washington studios without an audience because of the global coronavirus pandemic, in Washington, U.S., March 15, 2020. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo
WILMINGTON, Del. (Reuters) – Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden was scheduled on Monday to meet with community leaders in Wilmington, Delaware, the day after visiting a nearby site where protests against police brutality forced businesses to board up their windows.
Cities across the country awoke from a smoldering weekend of violent protests over race and policing sparked by the death of a black man, George Floyd, in Minneapolis police custody last Monday.
Floyd’s death was the latest in a string of similar incidents involving unarmed black men in recent years that have raised an outcry over excessive police force and racism, and re-ignited outrage across a politically and racially divided country just months before the Nov. 3 presidential election.
Biden, who will face Republican President Donald Trump in the election, said on Sunday that protesting police brutality was necessary “but burning down communities and needless destruction is not.”
It will be the third visit in the past week for Biden outside his Delaware home since he began sequestering from the coronavirus outbreak.
Later on Monday, he will hold a virtual event with U.S. mayors, his campaign said.
Writing by John Whitesides; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Steve Orlofsky
