I’m not watching the other networks but I’m guessing that’s going to be the general reaction: Republicans think it was good but not his best moment; Democrats will think it was bad but not his worst moment.
The response from the Fox News panel so far seems to be in line with the president having had a B/B+ night.
Clare, I think this other “investigations” line will actually be pointed to more: “If there is going to be peace and legislation, there cannot be war and investigation.”
It’s hard for me to think much will be remembered about this speech by Thursday. It was not memorable — like most State of the Union addresses. It was not particularly bad or good, but he largely repeated familiar ideas and themes.
Clare, I think the investigations line was the most notable. The other important part was the immigration section, which, by virtue of being typical Trump immigration rhetoric, was both forgettable and will have ramifications for next week’s negotiation deadline.
My overall impression: It was rosier than last year’s speech, which was strikingly dark, IMO. But it alienated Democrats as much as it tried to embrace them, so I don’t think this was a p*vot.
I think it’s safe to say that we won’t be recording a reaction podcast on this tomorrow. We were waiting to see if he made any news. He didn’t.
So what do we think people will remember from this speech, if anything? The line about partisan investigations? The visuals of scoffing Pelosi? Women in white?
Anyway, it’s not important. It’s just that the speech was such a hodgepodge of moods and themes that it’s hard to make much sense of it. And it probably means it isn’t going to matter much.
I still don’t think I know how Trump will get out of this wall debacle. And after hearing this speech, I don’t think he does either. Repeating the talking points from January I don’t think is going to get it done.
This also means immigration made up 17 percent of the speech.
He even got an extension on the writing deadline!
It’s also in the delivery, though, which made the lines feel more canned.
President Trump’s second State of the Union is officially over! By my watch, it lasted 84 minutes.
Writing always matters.
Wow, way to straw-man me, Clare. Of course writing matters. (Just not that much in this context.)
Yeah, I’m with Nate on that–writing matters!!!
This Nate piece made me slightly curious about the State of the Union. “Why I’m More Interested Than Usual In Tonight’s State Of The Union,” our editor in chief wrote. But after 80 minutes, I don’t think I have any greater idea about how the border wall dispute will be resolved. Trump is not pivoting, which Nate and everyone assumed already.
You’re a GODDAMNED EDITOR, MICAH! You’d better care about good writing.
Who cares! Let’s not play into elitist stereotypes of the media.
Everyone else on FiveThirtyEight Slack is afraid to say this publicly, but this is bad writing. Like a high school sophomore in an English composition class.
Infrastructure, ending HIV and most other policy proposals have, combined, gotten a lot less airtime than “it’s good that we fought the Nazis.”
Given Nate’s interest in rowdiness, how about we live-blog the next Prime Minister’s Questions?
I think we’re about at 80 minutes, so Trump has roughly equaled the length of his first State of the Union.
I think content matters, power dynamics matter, context matters, but, in general, I’m not attached to formal decorum, as anyone who follows me on Twitter probably knows already.
Trump is for the U.S. in World War II. This feels at times like a speech from a president without much of an agenda. You can’t give a State of the Union about 1. ending the Russia investigation, 2. getting re-elected, 3. appointing more conservative judges to the federal courts. But those three things, along with immigration, may be Trump’s actual goals.
I’m generally in favor of “U-S-A! U-S-A!” chants, just like I’m in favor of swearing.
Can we talk about the “U-S-A” chanting? This isn’t the first time that it’s broken out at a Trump State of the Union, but if we’re gonna talk about breaking norms, this isn’t exactly formal etiquette. During Obama’s last State of the Union, old campaign chants broke out. Maybe these are just getting rowdier and less formal — a possible format evolution.
FYI, the longest State of the Union is 1:29, by Bill Clinton in 2000.
What is Nancy Pelosi reading? Is it Trump’s speech?
Galen, a few years ago, Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin devoted his entire State of the State address to the opioid crisis. The speech made national headlines.
CORRECTION: Whoops! I mentioned the wrong Vermont governor. Peter Shumlin gave that speech, not Phil Scott.
A recent YouGov poll found that 61 percent of Americans would support a withdrawal from Afghanistan. So Trump is probably on firm footing with beginning such a move.
I personally am starting to lose track of all the ground we are covering. I know this is standard fare for such an address to span like 30 topics, but is there any argument that this would be more effective if he kept it to three topics and made it like 20 to 30 minutes?
Micah, I think this is a very interesting question. I’d bet that a whole lot of Democrats are talking about ways to reframe the “socialist” talk to be more “FDR/New Deal-y” for an American public that certainly has some generational aversions to socialism.
I think I might pledge to vote for any president, regardless of party, who promises to keep the State of the Union to
I’m not clear what he means by “the other side.”
The Syria and Afghanistan approaches of Trump (trying to get troops out) are not that popular with Democrats or Republicans. So there’s some nervous and tempered applause there.
Most Americans Don’t Think ISIS Has Been Defeated In Syria
Trump said that we have liberated virtually all of the territory controlled by ISIS in Iraq and Syria and touted his withdrawal of troops from Syria. But 72 percent of Americans said they do not believe that ISIS has been defeated in Syria, according to a Fox News poll from January. Only 12 percent said they believe ISIS has been defeated.
Clare et al. — if Trump just runs against “creeping socialism” this year and next — maybe no matter what Democrats do or say — could that … work?
I’d be pretty sure that it’s planned in advanced, Galen, and/or that it’s just sort of second nature for experienced producers and camera operators. FiveThirtyEight is owned by a television network, after all, so we’ve gotten to know how much prep work goes into any amount of TV.
“Great nations do not fight endless wars” is something the next president might say, too, particularly if he or she is a Democrat.
Trump expressed alarm at the “new calls to adopt socialism in our country.” According to a Fox News poll, the share of Americans who say they think it would be bad to move away from capitalism and toward socialism has decreased from 65 percent in 2009 to 54 percent in 2019. But only 24 percent say they think it would be a good thing (which is pretty much what it was in 2009).
I love how predictable these camera pans are. Did they plan in advance? On Venezuela, they panned to Bernie Sanders. On abortion, they panned to the Supreme Court justices.
Trump brings up North Korea now. Although the immigration “crisis” featured prominently in Trump’s address tonight, U.S. intelligence chiefs, who updated the Senate intelligence committee on Tuesday, don’t rank the U.S.-Mexican border as a top concern. Instead, North Korean nuclear weapons, Chinese cyber espionage, and Russian campaigns to undermine Western democracies top the list of their concerns.
It wouldn’t be a Tuesday night live blog without some election results. There’s a special election tonight for a swing seat in the Minnesota state Senate, where Republicans have just a two-seat majority. With 64 percent of precincts reporting, Republican Jason Rarick leads Democrat Stu Lourey 52 percent to 46 percent.
Trump going for the “Red Scare” approach as if it’s 1919 or 1950.