President Biden took a departing jab at Trump, saying that what the president-elect did was a “genuine threat to democracy.” 

Ahead of the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, Biden was asked if he still thought Trump was a threat to democracy.

“We’ve got to get back to establishing basic democratic norms,” Biden told reporters in the White House East Room on Sunday. “I think what he did was a genuine threat to democracy. I’m hopeful that we are beyond that.”

Biden made the comments to the press after signing the Social Security Fairness Act.

BIDEN ADMIN RIPPED AFTER JUDGE UPHOLDS PLEA DEALS FOR ALLEGED 9/11 MASTERMINDS: ‘KICK IN THE GUT

“The bill I’m signing today is about a simple proposition. Americans who have worked hard all of their lives to earn an honest living should be able to retire with economic security and dignity,” he said. “That’s the entire purpose of the Social Security system crafted by Franklin Delano Roosevelt nearly 90 years ago.”

The president said that the signing “is the culmination of a four-year fight.”

“As the first president in more than 20 years to expand social security benefits, this victory is the culmination of a four-year fight to provide security for workers who dedicate their lives to their communities, and I’m proud to have played a small part in this fight,” Biden said.

President Biden speaks to the media after signing the Social Security Fairness Act at the White House on Jan. 5, 2025. (CHRIS KLEPONIS/AFP via Getty Images)

The bill ends a pair of provisions — the Windfall Elimination Provision created in 1983 and the Government Pension Offset devised in 1977 — that curtail the social security benefits of some U.S. retirees receiving retirement benefits from another source, such as a local government or state-funded pension.

In the House, 327 members and 76 Senators voted to stand with around 3 million retired firefighters, police officers, teachers, and other public sector workers who also receive pension payments, Mick McHale, president of the National Association of Police Organizations, told Fox News Digital. 

“For over 40 years, the men and women, especially in the area of public safety… have been penalized as a result of the pension system that they belong to,” McHale said. 

Police and EMS vehicles respond to a mass casualty incident reported on Bourbon Street in New Orleans on Jan. 1, 2025. (WVUE)

Biden also discussed his plans to visit New Orleans on Monday to grieve with family members of victims and meet with officials after the terrorist attack in the city on New Year’s Day.

DID BIDEN DO ENOUGH ON TERROR?

“I’ve been there. There’s nothing you can really say to somebody who has had such a tragic loss. And my message is going to be personal to them,” he said. “They just have to hang on to each other and there will come a day when they think of their loved one, and they’ll smile before a tear comes to their eye.”

A memorial for the victims of the New Orleans New Years’ attack on Jan. 1, 2025. (Audrey Conklin/Fox News Digital)

The visit comes after 14 people were killed and dozens injured after police said 42-year-old Shamsud-Din Jabbar rammed a rented pickup truck into pedestrians on bustling Bourbon Street early Wednesday morning. Police fatally shot Jabbar after he opened fire on officers.

“We established beyond any reasonable doubt that New Orleans was a single man who acted alone. All the talk about conspiracies with other people, no evidence of that, zero,” Biden said.

“He had real problems in terms of his own, I think, mental health, going on. And he acted alone in the same way as what went on in Las Vegas,” Biden said. “But there is no evidence, zero evidence of the idea that these are foreigners coming across the border, but they worked here, they remained here.”

Fox News Digital’s Louis Casiano Jr. contributed to this report.

When the new Congress convenes Friday, there will be fewer people of color in the delegation than in recent years.

The 119th Congress will have 136 people of color, four fewer than the previous U.S. House and Senate, which was the most ethnically and racially diverse in history. However, this year’s delegation consists of several firsts, including the first time an openly transgender woman has served in Congress.

When it comes to parity between congressional representatives and the populations they serve, Illinois and Ohio are the only states with the same percentage of people of color in both. People of color make up 42% of Illinois’ population and representation; Ohio is 24%.

Several other states are close to parity. New Mexico’s population is 64% nonwhite and 36% white. In the House and Senate, two out of five representatives are white, while 40% are nonwhite. Arizona’s representation is 55% white compared with 52% in its population.

Sixty-seven percent of California’s population and 52% of its representatives are people of color. The state’s delegation includes the highest number of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders with 10 members.

Less than a third of the 119th Congress are women. In the new Congress, six states have no female House or Senate members. Seven states have higher female representation in Congress than in their population.

U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.) made history in November by becoming the first transgender member of Congress, four years after she became the first openly transgender state senator in the United States. Her victory represents a significant step forward for LGBTQ+ representation in government.

U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.) is the first openly transgender member of Congress.

(Carolyn Kaster / Associated Press)

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“My service is a testament to the fair-mindedness of Delawareans who this November demonstrated what I have seen throughout my life: that they judge candidates based on their ideas, not their identities,” McBride said. “I know how much this news would have meant to me as a young person growing up, worried that the heart of this country was simply not big enough to love someone like me, to have seen an out trans person get elected to federal office.”

North Dakota also had a milestone with Republican Julie Fedorchak becoming the first woman to represent the state in the U.S. House of Representatives. Fedorchak is also the first freshman in 14 years to be seated on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

“What’s most important to me is how I use this,” Fedorchak told The Times. “I’m really excited to join the Republican women, a majority of them have great backgrounds and are really serious about good policy.”

Mississippi is the only state yet to send a woman to the House.

The elections of Sens. Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.) and Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.) mark the first time two Black women have served on the U.S. Senate simultaneously.

In 2023, Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.) became Vermont’s first woman and out LGBTQ+ congressperson.

(Amanda Andrade-Rhoades / Associated Press)

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In 2023, the 118th Congress was the most ethnically and racially diverse U.S. House and Senate in history. U.S. Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.) was the first member of Generation Z to walk the congressional corridors. Trailblazers like Democrats U.S. Rep. Becca Balint, Vermont’s first woman and out LGBTQ+ congressperson, and U.S. Rep. Summer Lee, Pennsylvania’s first Black woman in Congress, shattered long-standing glass ceilings.

New Jersey is the only state with an all-minority Senate delegation in the country.

Newly elected Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) is the first Korean American in the Senate. Kim said that while he is proud to break barriers, he looks forward to the day when his role in Congress is no longer seen as groundbreaking or pioneering, but commonplace. The night he was sworn into Congress, Kim called his mother who was crying tears of joy.

“It was really powerful to see this moment, not just for my family but for what it means to Korean Americans, Asian Americans, and what it means to immigrant families,” Kim said. “Hopefully they can see a continuation of this American dream that has been a shared pursuit for so many different ethnic groups and communities.”