Biden Honors JFK’s Legacy on 60th Anniversary of Assassination

‘I was in college and had just left class, joining other students glued to the news in silence,' the president recalls the day of JFK’s death.

(L-R) Secretary of State Antony Blinken looks on as U.S. President Joe Biden speaks during a meeting about countering the flow of fentanyl into the United States, in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, on Nov. 21, 2023. Drew Angerer/Getty Images

President Joe Biden on Wednesday reflected on the 60th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination, calling it a “defining moment of deep trauma and loss that shocked the soul of our nation.”

“In life and in death, President Kennedy changed the way we saw ourselves—a country full of youthful hopes and ambition, steeled with the seasoned strength of a people who’ve overcome profound loss by turning pain into unyielding purpose,” President Biden wrote in a statement. “He called us to take history into our own hands, and to never quit striving to build an America that lives up to its highest ideals.”