Thread by @mikememoli

Crowd filling in for evening @JoeBiden rally in Dubuque

Iowa State Sen. Pam Jochum speaking now, reading a letter @JoeBiden sent to her after her daughter died last year. "She will continue to be your heart, your soul, and yes, a compass for the future," Biden wrote.

The story led Biden to start off script, talking about bonds he's made on the campaign trail with others who've suffered loss. And then he tells more stories. ...

Biden says again today: "You’re going to be seeing a lot of me. No one is going to work harder to win your trust and your help."

Biden: They talk about divisions in the Democratic Party. "We agree on basically everything running -- all 400 of us." Good laugh from the Iowa audience

Biden: Limited to four years, history will treat this administration's time as an aberration in time. But, but, if there’s eight years of this administration it will forever and fundamentally change and alter the character of this nation.

Revisiting Charlottesville, again, Biden says: "We have to put an end, electorally, to this administration."

Biden loves telling crowds a story about a New Yorker cartoon he has had in his offices, the punch line of it is "How was I supposed to know he was a job creator."

I'm not sure I've seen a crowd yet who gets the punch line based on his description. But he'll tell it again

Here's the cartoon, via @daveweigel. He's been talking about it for years

Biden had a teleprompter yesterday in Pittsburgh but not at either stop in Iowa today. He's often looking down at remarks often as he works to get used to this new stump speech

Biden again raising the stakes on entitlements. After Trump tax cuts, he predicts that if Trump is reelected and GOP holds Senate, wins House, we'll face "battle of our lifetimes. "If I'm elected president, it WILL NOT HAPPEN!"

Biden: "We have to get rid of the Trump-DeVos education agenda." Also notes cuts in education by GOP governors

Biden promises on student loans: I’m going to be releasing a plan to cut their debt, reduce their debt. But says he doesn't want to hold crowd up with the details now

Biden took a detour away from the lectern to pace around stage as he ended policy broad strokes and neared his closing refrain. "Folks I get a little too excited about this."

Biden closes: "Everyone knows who Donald Trump is. We’ve got to learn who we are. We’ve got to know who we are. We choose hope over fear. We choose unity over division. We choose truth over lies. And we choose science over fiction."