Hours ahead of President Joe Biden’s visit on Monday to New Orleans — his first since the violent attack on New Year’s Day that left 14 people dead — law enforcement officers swarmed a blockaded Jackson Square, where Biden and his wife, first lady Jill Biden, were expected to attend an evening prayer and memorial service at St. Louis Cathedral.

President Joe Biden is taking a message to the grieving families of victims in the deadly New Year's attack in New Orleans: "It takes time. You got to hang on." Biden on Monday arrived in the city where an Army veteran drove a truck into revelers in the French Quarter,

Biden said he was briefed by the FBI, which informed him the suspect’s truck contained a remote detonator to set off explosives planted within two ice chests in the French Quarter hours before the truck attack (the explosives were later identified and rendered safe by authorities).