People say Biden has been unlucky as president, but consider how extraordinarily fortunate he is that the science on masking changed so definitively on the day before his first State of the Union.
Your annual reminder that the State of the Union is a disgraceful, monarchical, unrepublican tradition that should be abolished, or at least downgraded to an annual letter.
The saddest suggestion I saw on Twitter was David Corn and Norman Ornstein begging Biden to have Zelensky Zoom in and address Congress. Such a transparent effort to have Biden free ride on a foreign leader's popular moment. Also, it's 3am in Kiev, I think Zelensky has more important priorities, like getting some sleep and/or remaining alive.
Masks are few and far between among attendees as people enter the chamber. The Capitol’s attending physician, Brian Monahan, announced Sunday that masks would be optional for members of Congress and other attendees in light of decreasing Covid-19 case rates. The maskless faces appear to signal that the U.S. has finally entered a new phase in its Covid response.
We are about fifteen minutes away from what is going to be one of the oddest State of the Union addresses in a long while. The annual address rarely lives up to the hype, it rarely moves the poll numbers very much or for very long, and it rarely changes any minds on Capitol Hill. Joe Biden has never been the greatest of orators; he settles into his predictable whisper whisper whisper SHOUT SHOUT SHOUT whisper whisper whisper rhythm. This presidency already lost momentum at the end of last year, and the biggest land war in Europe since 1945 just makes tonight's expected routine calls for raising the minimum wage and nursing home inspections seem like small potatoes. Tonight, even more than most years, at the end of the president's speech, people will fairly ask… did any of what we just heard matter?
Democrats have failed to shepherd both Biden’s Build Back Better bill and the party’s “voting rights” bill through the Senate. Biden may use his SOTU address to lay out a path forward for BBB, according to reports.
Yet despite the struggles of his first year in office, Biden is expected to take a victory lap and tout his accomplishments. He is likely to discuss his historic Supreme Court nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and his administration’s ongoing efforts to bring the U.S. closer to a state of pre-pandemic normalcy.
Biden is reportedly planning to announce that the U.S. will ban Russian planes from its airspace after Canada and the European Union did the same in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to the Associated Press.
Democrats are hoping Biden can use the speech to rehab his poor approval rating; Just 41.1 percent of Americans approve of the job Biden is doing, while 53.5 percent disapprove, according to a FiveThirtyEight analysis of recent polling.
Biden’s support has waned during his first year in office, which saw inflation increase at the fastest rate in 40 years.
According to prepared remarks released by the White House, Biden will say: “We have a choice. One way to fight inflation is to drive down wages and make Americans poorer. I have a better plan to fight inflation. Lower your costs, not your wages.”
“Throughout our history we’ve learned this lesson – when dictators do not pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos,” Biden plans to say, according to prepared remarks released by the White House. “They keep moving. And, the costs and threats to America and the world keep rising.”
The president will add: “Putin’s war was premeditated and unprovoked. He rejected efforts at diplomacy. He thought the West and NATO wouldn’t respond. And, he thought he could divide us here at home. Putin was wrong. We were ready.”
President Biden will deliver his first State of the Union address at 9 p.m.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki has said viewers can expect the president to discuss the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but also to share “his optimism and his belief in the resilience of the American people and the strength of the American people.”
Biden will use the speech, which comes on the sixth day of the Russian invasion, to outline efforts his administration has taken “to rally the world to stand up for democracy and against Russian aggression” and to “mitigate the impact of President Putin’s invasion of Ukraine on the global economy and the American people,” she said.
Psaki told reporters on Monday that “there's no question that this speech is a little different than it would have been just a few months ago.”