DNC Embraces Bruce Springsteen’s Post-9/11 Song ‘The Rising’

The Democratic National Convention featured Bruce Springsteen’s post-9/11 song “The Rising” in a video montage during the opening night of the convention on Monday showing footage of Americans rising up in various protests.

The video, which Springsteen tweeted out with the hashtag #therising, shows images of Black Lives Matter protests, Americans cheering first responders during the Covid-19 pandemic, and other images from rallies held by the Democrat’s presumptive nominee Joe Biden.

“We are the United States of America. There’s not a single thing we cannot do if we do it together,” Biden wrote in a tweet with the video attached, which Springsteen retweeted with the words “Come on up for #therising.”

“The Rising” is from on a 2002 album of the same name released in the wake of the September 11 terror attacks. At Monday’s DNC convention the song’s title, and Springsteen’s #risingup hashtag, evoked the theme of rising up at a time of mass protests across the country over the issue of racial equality following the death of George Floyd, whose brothers, Philonise and Rodney Floyd, spoke at Monday night’s convention and led a moment of silence “to honor George and the many other souls we lost to hate and injustice.”

The video montage featured the refrain “Come on, rise up. Come on, rise up,” from the song “My City in Ruins,” which is also on Springsteen’s 2002 The Rising album.

Though many of the songs on The Rising were written after the 9/11 attacks, some of them pre-dated 9/11, including the song “My City in Ruins,” which Springsteen wrote in November 2000, for a Christmas benefit concert in Asbury, New Jersey. However, the song took on new meaning when it was performed during the post-9/11 America: A Tribute to Heroes telethon on September 21, 2001.

Rebecca Mansour is a Senior Editor-at-Large for Breitbart News. Follow her on Twitter at @RAMansour.