2020 Democratic front-runner Joe Biden’s “No Malarkey!” bus is no more. The former vice president debuted a new campaign bus during his first 2020 stop in Iowa.
The bus, revealed Thursday, shows the 36-year Delaware senator’s campaign logo alongside the tagline “battle for the soul of the nation,” one of Biden’s major campaign themes that alludes to how President Trump changed the country’s political landscape.
“I think our very democracy is at stake,” Biden, 77, said during a campaign stop in Anamosa, Iowa, on Thursday. “Democracy has to be earned, as we used to learn in school. It turns out to be right. It has to be earned by every generation.”
NEW YEAR, New Bus: “No Malarkey” here, the Biden bus traveling through Iowa has a new look. It’s now broadcasting @JoeBiden’s reminder that America is currently in “The Battle for the Soul of the Nation.” pic.twitter.com/aXx3oqnd0N
— Marianna Sotomayor (@MariannaNBCNews) January 2, 2020
Biden ditches ‘No Malarkey!’ bus wrap, replacing it with ‘restoring the soul of the nation,’ a common campaign refrain. Now I’m journalistically obligated to look for malarkey. pic.twitter.com/ILjZdLwnco
— Cleve R. Wootson Jr. (@CleveWootson) January 2, 2020
During an eight-day tour through rural Iowa in early December, Biden rode on a campaign bus that read, “No Malarkey!” in an unconventional, whimsical font. “The malarkey stops here,” the bottom of that bus read. Social media users mocked Biden for turning an obscure word into a campaign slogan.
Biden most famously invoked the term during a 2012 vice presidential debate against Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan. Biden dismissed Ryan’s criticism of the Obama administration. “That’s a bunch of stuff,” Biden said. “We Irish call it malarkey.”
Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden are scheduled to make campaign stops in Iowa through Sunday ahead of the Feb. 3 Iowa caucuses, the first statewide Democratic presidential nominating contest of the 2020 season.
