Joe Biden delivered what may be his last State of the Union address — as well as arguably one of the most important speeches of his presidency, thanks to how much has been going wrong with his reelection campaign thus far — to Congress on Thursday night. The GOP’s official response came in the form of a kitchen talking-to from Alabama senator and rising Republican star Katie Britt. Below is a running roundup of how pundits and other commentators have reacted to the two speeches.
On Joe Biden’s Big Night
Biden was feisty and in Trump’s face
Intelligencer’s Ed Kilgore writes that the president seemed not at all grandfatherly — and very comfortable on offense against his once and future opponent:
He saved perhaps his cleverest gambit for near the end, mentioning his own age (very much the elephant in every room Biden enters this year) but identifying Trump as the dark side of his own generation:
“My lifetime has taught me to embrace freedom and democracy. A future based on the core values that have defined America. Honesty. Decency. Dignity. Equality. To respect everyone. To give everyone a fair shot. To give hate no safe harbor. Now some other people my age see a different story. An American story of resentment, revenge, and retribution. That’s not me.”
Biden’s delivery was fiery, a bit rushed, and he occasionally stumbled over his words, but it was anything but low-energy.
Biden did what he had to do with his economic pitch
David Axelrod, the former senior Obama administration adviser who has been repeatedly critical of Biden’s reelection campaign thus far, praised the bread-and-butter section of the speech:
‘Joe from Delaware’ might not win over disaffected workers
Paul Sracic, a politics professor at Youngstown State University and Hudson Institute adjunct fellow, told CNN that he didn’t think Biden did enough to win over white working-class voters without college degrees who have been voting for Trump:
[Missing] was any acknowledgement of why these voters might have turned against Democrats in the first place. For example, Biden might have empathized with workers whose jobs are under threat due to the transition away from fossil fuel, or admitted that gas prices and high interest rates are still making life difficult for many Americans. …
At the end of his speech, Biden reminded voters that he “grew up among working people” in Scranton. Curiously enough, he also mentioned his childhood in Claymont, Delaware. In context, he meant “working people” in both states, but earlier in the speech, when he ad-libbed a reference to Delaware, he did so to reassure America that he was not against business.
Insofar as the Democratic Party has managed to balance a loss of White, working-class voters with growing support among more educated, wealthier voters, perhaps one takeaway from this speech was that the 2024 campaign was going to feature more of “Joe from Delaware,” and less “Joe from Scranton.”
The GOP’s heckling and low expectations backfired again
At The Atlantic, David A. Graham notes that Republicans set Biden up to succeed:
At times, the address was less a speech than a conversation. Republican members of Congress repeatedly heckled Biden, who was happy to mix it up with them. In one colloquy, the president attacked GOP tax policies as a handout to corporations and the wealthy, eliciting jeers. “You’re saying no. Look at the facts,” Biden smirked. “I know you know how to read.” Biden also engineered a predictable but successful trap by praising a bipartisan border-security bill that Republicans killed at Donald Trump’s behest. When Republicans booed, Biden broke out into a broad, Cheshire-cat smile. “Oh, you don’t like that bill?” he said. “I’ll be darned.”
The exchanges were a gift to Biden, whose aides had hinted that he wanted to talk back to hecklers, just as he did last year. They see these moments as opportunities for Biden to prove that he’s fast on his feet and not the senile shell some of his critics say he is. For the second year in a row, Republicans set a very low bar for Biden’s speech, and once again, he cleared it without much trouble.
It could help reset the Biden campaign narrative, if the campaign and its supporters take the baton
At the HuffPost, Jonathan Cohn argues that as far as SOTU speeches go, this could be a very useful one, moving forward:
Although one energetic speech isn’t going to quell anybody’s doubts about whether Biden is fit to serve a second term, it could give him a chance to shift the focus of conversation ― away from questions about mental or physical acuity, and onto the substantive stakes of the election. Biden on Thursday night did just that, touting his defense of abortion rights, his record and future plans on prescription drug prices, and his determination to shift more of the tax burden back onto the wealthiest Americans. In all of these cases, he was drawing clear lines between himself and his partisan adversaries, fully aware that ― as polls and recent elections have shown ― the majority of Americans are on his side of the divide, not theirs.
Not every issue breaks down so favorably, including two that Biden covered at length on Thursday: immigration and the ongoing conflict in Gaza. But in a conversation that’s more about Biden’s views and his record than his abilities, he can at least make a case for his approaches on both issues ― and why he thinks they put him closer to would-be supporters than Trump is.
No single event could transform the campaign, and the State of the Union address was no exception. But it may have increased the chances that Biden and his supporters can transform it on their own.
Trump World thought the speech went so well, Biden must have been on drugs
Intelligencer’s Jonathan Chait explains that after Biden defied the feeble expectations they set for him, Trump and his allies decided to claim the president was Barry Bonds–ing it with performance-enhancing drugs:
It is theoretically possible, I suppose, that an 81-year-old teetotaling Catholic has suddenly embarked upon a drug-fueled lifestyle. But this raises the question of why, exactly, we should care that Biden is using these wonder drugs to elevate his public performance. After all, in sports, we limit steroid use and other performance-enhancing drugs because those drugs have awful side effects, and give those willing to accept them an unfair advantage. What are the side effects of Biden’s alleged drug use? (Other Trump posts mentioned Biden’s coughing, which, if true, seem like an acceptable trade-off for turning a dementia-riddled zombie into a sprightly leader.)
Biden’s speech exceeded the media’s very low expectations, too
Vox’s Andrew Prokop argues that the the aftermath of the SOTU shows how media coverage of Biden and his campaign up to now has been too focused on trivialities:
[One of the two major concerns in the political coverage of the president’s age is that] Biden is failing to appropriately “perform” the role of president or presidential candidate — that, whatever the truth, he hasn’t been good at seeming like he’s in command, like he’s energetic, can handle tough questioning, and is up to the job.
This criticism inevitably devolves into theater criticism because it’s fundamentally about performance. By saying that, I don’t mean to dismiss it. This concern is often voiced by people who want Democrats to defeat Trump — they fear Biden is no longer up to the rigors of the campaign trail, or that he simply just seems old in a way that won’t appeal to voters. They believe defeating Trump is very important, and worry Biden will fail to do it.
All of that makes sense. But often, the way this stuff is covered day-to-day becomes vapid and ridiculous, from both ends. We swing from “Biden made a gaffe in a press conference, heightening age concerns” to “Biden read a fiery speech, quelling age concerns.” But neither event really tells us much.
‘There’s life in the old boy yet.’
The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan seemed at least somewhat impressed:
The great question the past month was about his persona. Would he walk in shakily? When he was done, would we be using words like old, frail, incapable, embarrassing? We won’t. People will say that guy has a lot of fight in him. He was wide awake, seemed to be relishing the moment, did not seem to tire much, and in fact improved as the speech moved along.
He showed energy and focus, blurred some words and thoughts, maintained a brisk pace. He almost never spoke softly. He sometimes yelled. There was a give-’em-hell-Harry vibration, as if he’d been reading up on Truman. The White House meant to quell growing Democratic fears on the president’s age and acuity. They succeeded, at least for a while. Congressional Democrats looked happy to the point of bubbly when it was over.
It can also be said the president often maintained an indignant and hectoring tone that he confuses with certitude and commitment. In the end I don’t know if the speech came across to a viewer at home as strong and focused or, as has been said, “Angry Old Man Yells at Clouds.” That probably depends on where you stand on Joe Biden.
Biden’s use of the term ‘illegal’ has drawn fire from other Democrats
Biden described a migrant as an “illegal” while offering an impromptu response to heckling from congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green during Thursday’s address. That didn’t go over well with a number of Democrats and other progressive critics and prompted multiple social media posts from lawmakers insisting that “No human being is illegal.” The Texas Tribune has more:
“It’s dangerous rhetoric. And I think that the president is getting bad advice from his advisers and speech writers. That kind of rhetoric is what inspired the people who killed Aaron Martinez,” U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro said, referring to a North Texas man who was killed by his neighbor who repeatedly harassed Martinez’s family over their Latino ethnicity. Castro brought Martinez’s wife, Priscilla Martinez, as his guest Thursday.
“I just don’t get why the president will go down that road,” Castro added. “I don’t think it’s helpful to him or to the Democratic Party.”
U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, an El Paso Democrat who is also a co-chair of Biden’s reelection campaign, said “that is the statutory language,” though “it’s not the language I use.”
A national co-chair of Biden’s reelection campaign, Mitch Landrieu, said Friday on CNN that the president “probably should’ve used a different word and I think he would know that.”
Biden eventually said he regretted using the term, telling Jonathan Capeheart in an interview that aired on Saturday, “I shouldn’t have used ‘illegal.’ It’s ‘undocumented,’”
The man who was removed from the House gallery after disrupting Biden’s speech was a Gold Star father
Steve Nikoui’s son, Lance Cpl. Kareem Nikoui, was killed along with 12 other U.S. servicemembers and at least 170 Afghan civilians in the August 2021 terrorist attack at the Kabul airport amid the frantic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. Nikoui, 51, attended the State of the Union as a guest of Florida congressman Brian Mast. During Biden’s speech, Nikoui yelled out, “Remember Abbey Gate! U.S. Marines!” — referring to the airport entrance where the ISIS-K suicide bomber had targeted a large crowd of civilians who had amassed in the hope of gaining entry and getting on a plane out of the city after it was reclaimed by Taliban fighters.
A year after Kareem Nikoui’s death in Afghanistan, his brother died by suicide at a memorial site dedicated to Kareem.
The father was handcuffed and led out of the House gallery following his apparently planned protest. He was arrested by U.S. Capitol police on a misdemeanor charge before being released a few hours a later. According to Representative Mast’s office, Nikoui and his wife, Shana Chappel, have been vocal critics of how the Biden managed the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and blame the president for their son’s death.
Biden did well, but will it matter?
New York Times deputy opinion editor Patrick Healy points to history:
Most State of the Union addresses don’t shape re-election outcomes, as was the case with Trump’s in 2020 or George H.W. Bush’s in 1992, but they can help define a president’s narrative, as Bill Clinton did with the economy, George W. Bush did with national security and Barack Obama did with health care.
If Biden can repeat this performance on the campaign trail and in interviews, it could be a State of the Union that has legs. And why not? He seemed nimble: One of his best moments was a quick comeback when he was facing Republican boos about tax cut ideas and he quipped, “I kind of thought that’s what your plan was.” It was a good line. A guy who can do that can find ways on the trail to show voters that, regardless of age, he’s still pretty vigorous.
On Katie Britt’s Home-Invasion SOTU Response
Britt’s speech was totally and tonally bizarre
Intelligencer’s Ed Kilgore was simultaneously befuddled and creeped out, noting that “if Britt’s speech was alternatively lurid and banal, it was the delivery that really grabbed you, and not in a good way”:
Like she was auditioning for a soap-opera role that required a broad range of over-the-top emotions, Britt went from weepy to furious to gleeful to solemn, and executed abrupt changes in pitch and volume. …
Perhaps like Bobby Jindal, the Louisiana wonder-boy who bombed in his State of the Union response to Barack Obama in 2009, Britt felt the need to talk down to her audience, or maybe she was over-coached. At one point, she said “the American Dream has turned into a nightmare.” Personally, I fear I will encounter Katie Britt in my nightmares, whispering “we see you” until I wake up screaming.
AL.com columnist Kyle Whitmire marveled at the weirdness of Britt’s speech too, but wasn’t surprised that she didn’t seem real. “Britt’s problem is an old one in Alabama politics — she couldn’t be genuine and win,” he writes, “so she chose to be fake”:
There’s nothing I can quote from Britt’s speech that can convey the strangeness of it — the mismatched emotions, the smiles in the wrong places, the jaw clenched when it shouldn’t have been — just the indescribable weirdness. It was something that had to be seen, but even then, couldn’t be understood — like postmodernism, avant-garde performance art or an involuntary behavioral science experiment. …
All she had to do was look into the camera and read, but she tried to do more. Too much more. Her handlers attempted to brand this political newcomer as “America’s mom,” but instead, she came off as the aunt who’s been spending too much time on Facebook, and if you don’t change the subject soon, she’s going to tell you about sex dungeons beneath the pizza parlor.
I supposed we should focus on the substance of Britt’s speech, instead of its delivery, but that, too, seemed written by ChatGPT.
Britt falsely blamed Biden in the story she told about a sex-trafficking victim
The lurid story she told about a sex-trafficking victim’s suffering to illustrate the Biden administration’s border policy failures recounted crimes that happened 20 years ago in Mexico, independent journalist Jonathan Katz reported on Friday. Read about it here.
It was like a parody of a terrible line reading
One widely shared tweet on Thursday night made that exact comparison using a Curb Your Enthusiasm clip:
Another quip along similar lines:
And for the sake of stark comparison:
As everyone predicted, Saturday Night Live skewered the speech, as well, bringing in Scarlett Johansson to play Britt as though she were giving a bad audition for the role of “scary mom”:
Yeah, Britt was weird, but maybe it worked for the MAGA audience
At the New York Times, Michelle Cottle acknowledges that many of the people expressing revulsion over Britt’s awkward SOTU response weren’t the target audience:
Overemotional, apocalyptic, inappropriately personal, unbalanced — this is how an awful lot of Trump voters are feeling. They are convinced the American dream is indeed on the verge of collapse, that the end of civilization is nigh and that the liberal hordes are coming for their families. They are looking for leaders who don’t just validate their panic but seem to share it. It is perhaps worth noting that Donald Trump was singing Britt’s praises afterward on his site: “Katie Britt was a GREAT contrast to an Angry, and obviously very Disturbed, ‘President.’”
The senator’s performance may have given me a morning migraine. But I’m guessing there were plenty of other folks, including much of the MAGAverse, who found it spot-on.
But Trump World people were less than thrilled
According to the Daily Beast:
A GOP strategist told The Daily Beast that Britt’s delivery quickly became a gossip item Thursday night among operatives connected to Donald Trump—something that could have potential implications for her consideration as a vice presidential pick on the 2024 ticket.
“Everyone’s fucking losing it,” this Republican said, requesting anonymity to discuss private conversations. “It’s one of our biggest disasters ever.”
“No one was surprised that [Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell’s handpicked senator resonated so poorly with the base,” said a source close to Trump, who requested anonymity for similar reasons. (Britt is a favorite of McConnell, which has made Trumpworld suspicious.)
“But her performance was the stuff of nightmares and people were surprised by that,” they continued.
The Beast also notes that a number of GOP-linked officials have publicly questioned the logic of having Britt deliver her speech from her kitchen. She has faced public criticism, as well:
Britt was an illustration of bad MAGA playacting
Notes the Bulwark’s Tim Miller in a tweet:
But did ‘America’s mom’ reach America’s moms?
Washington Post columnist Monica Hesse, noting how Britt’s comm team advised supporters to call her “America’s mom” in a pre-speech memo, wonders if that whole vibe worked:
When Britt did appear, it became clear she’d gone balls-to-the-wall with the mom theme, broadcasting solo from her Alabama kitchen in such a way that, if you were watching with the volume down, you would have assumed you had stumbled upon a commercial for either stain remover or Il Makiage. Turn the volume up and there was Britt opening by saying that her proudest role was being a “wife and mother,” before segueing into describing a violent gang rape, before calling Biden “dithering and diminished,” and explaining that we were all “steeped in the blood of patriots,” which, ladies — if that’s a menstruation euphemism I hadn’t heard it before. Somehow she wrapped up by talking about how America put a man on the moon. …
Women are not monolith, and I am assuming there were plenty of viewers who were very moved by Britt’s rebuttal. Toward the end, when she stared into the camera and implored, “Tonight, I want to make a direct appeal to the parents out there — and in particular, to my fellow moms.” She later continued, “First of all, we see you, we hear you, and we stand with you.”
But moms aren’t monolith, either. And so it wasn’t entirely clear which ones she thought she was representing, sitting there in her kitchen. Some may have seen themselves in the latest Republican to talk about how women and moms figure into their vision for America. Others have seen enough elsewhere to know where they stand.
Britt weaponized motherhood
Intelligencer’s Sarah Jones writes:
Moms, she said, wonder how they’re going to be three places at once and still get dinner on the table. Do America’s moms have a choice in this scenario? Where exactly are the dads, and what injury prevents them from cooking? For women, the kitchen can be a place of exile, too; a location they inhabit out of necessity rather than choice. Should Britt and her party get their way, women may find themselves exiled again. If she believes women can be anything but the wives of men — that unmarried women, or queer women, might lay claim to equality — it’s not obvious.
“We are steeped in the blood of patriots,” she said toward the end of her speech. It’s violent imagery, suitable for the party of insurrection. When she said it, her kitchen became even less inviting; became, briefly, contested territory — a place secured through brutality. America’s ideal woman serves her family atop a heap of bodies. Like Britt, she knows her place, and is willing to fight for it. She’ll never know equality, but she may win power. Britt showed America what that looks like on Thursday. The face she presented was unpleasant, off-putting, and therefore truthful. This is all the GOP has to offer women, and everyone else, too.
This post has been updated to include new commentary.
