MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace: Jimmy Carter Was a ‘Beacon of Decency,’ Something Joe Biden ‘Knows Firsthand’

CARTER: “The struggle for human rights overrides all differences of color or nation or language. Those who hunger for freedom, who thirst for human dignity, and who suffer for the sake of justice, they are the patriots of this cause. I believe with all my heart that America must always stand for these basic human rights at home and abroad. That is both our history and our destiny. America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense, it’s the other way around. Human rights invented America. Ours was the first nation in the history of the world to be founded explicitly on such an idea. Our social and political progress has been based on one fundamental principle: the value and importance of the individual. The fundamental force that unites us is not kinship or place of origin or religious preference. The love of liberty is the common blood that flows in our American veins.”

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Wallace: “Taken as a whole, his life is a portrait of a man who represents the very best this nation has to offer, a legacy as a public servant and as a humanitarian who is a beacon of decency, something his longtime friend, President Joe Biden, knows firsthand.”

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Biden: “America and the world, in my view, lost a remarkable leader. He was a statesman, a humanitarian. And Jill and I lost a dear friend. I‘ve been hanging out with Jimmy Carter for over 50 years. Jimmy Carter stands as a model of what it means to live a life of meaning and purpose, life of principle, faith and humility. His life dedicated to others. Decency. Decency. Everybody deserves a shot. Everybody. One of the reasons why we’re looked to by the rest of the world, for the bulk of our — our nation, we’ve laid out what our values are. We said what we believe. It’s not just in the declaration we hold these truths be self-evident, but there’s a feeling, the rest of the world looks to us. Looks to us. And he was worth looking to.”

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Wallace: “He was worth looking to.”