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Biden tells Chesterfield crowd, “It’s not your father’s Republican party”

Posted at 7:11 PM, Sep 25, 2012
and last updated 2012-09-25 19:11:32-04

CHESTERFIELD, VA (WTVR) -- Vice-President Joe Biden returned to Virginia for the seventh time this year, this time to campaign at the Chesterfield County Fairgrounds.

"What a magnificently beautiful state you all have," Biden told the crowd.

While Biden began his speech with a bit of humor after a woman showed him her Delaware shirt, he quickly shifted to attack mode. "The middle class was decimated by the polices that produced this recession," he told the crowd.

The Vice-President echoed President Clinton's recent speech saying "what they're proposing is Bush on steroids."

Biden hit the Republicans hard on the mantra reiterated by Governor Romney to CBS 6 in an interview Monday, in which he said "I don't subscribe to the idea of raising taxes."

"They don't need another tax cut," Biden said.  "I don't want to hear the middle class has to do more, we have to lift the burden off of the middle class."

Republicans, for their part, waited outside the event venue to rebut the Biden's remarks.

"The country can not survive with higher taxes, which is what Joe Biden and Barack Obama and Tim Kaine have been promising," Pete Snyder, Chair of the Republican Victory Campaign, said. 

"It's not your father's Republican party," Biden told the crowd.

Apart from the issue of taxes, Vice-President Biden criticized Gov. Romney over his "47 percent remark" in which he was caught on a hidden camera saying that 47 percent of Americans do not pay taxes.

"If the 47 percent doesn't make it, the country doesn't make it," Biden said.

The Vice-President ended his speech by speaking to veterans in the audience, a demographic that the Obama/Biden campaign is losing ground on Romney.

"We must never ever forget their sacrifices, we must keep them in our care," Biden said.

The event was held in an exhibition hall at the Chesterfield County Fairgrounds.

While the campaign told CBS 6 the official crowd estimate was just over 600, many noticed how small the crowd was compared to other campaign events in the area.

"Chesterfield is more Cantor territory," Brenton Wine, a Biden supporter told the crowd. "The size doesn't really mater its the passion of the people here," Wine added.

President Obama will next campaign in the state on Thursday in Virginia Beach, Romney will campaign that same day in Springfield, Va.