“Peddlers of lies are threatening the very foundation of our country,” Biden said.

“No election has ever been held under such scrutiny and high standards. The Big Lie is just that: the Big Lie.”

Biden continued: “In America, if you lose, you accept the results. You follow the constitution. You try again. You don’t call facts ‘fake’ and try to bring down the American experiment just because you’re unhappy.”

Biden said the “unprecedented wave of voter suppression” being proposed by Republican state legislators across the country was “simply unconscionable”.

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“There is an unfolding assault taking place in America today,” he said. “An assault on democracy, an assault on liberty, an assault on who we are as Americans.”

America now faces the “most significant test of democracy since the Civil War”, Biden said.

“The world is watching,” he added.

Referring to past laws that restricted the rights of African Americans to vote, Biden said: “The 21st century Jim Crow assault is real. It’s unrelenting. We’re going to challenge it vigorously.”

But Biden disappointed progressive activists by declining to call for the US Senate to scrap its “filibuster” rule that establishes a 60-vote threshold for most legislation, including voting rights bills.

Democrats in the US Congress have proposed sweeping legislation to overhaul the nation’s voting rules, but have no hope of reaching the required 60-vote threshold to pass their bill through the evenly divided Senate.

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