What to know
- President Donald Trump gave his first State of the Union address of his second term tonight. As is often the case, Trump made several false and misleading claims, including about his administration’s policies on the social safety network, such as Medicare and Social Security, foreign investment and Somali fraud in Minnesota. The speech came as the country is mired in a partial government shutdown, reeling from immigration enforcement operations and facing the possibility of a military conflict in Iran.
- The president spoke at length about the state of the economy, touting tax cuts and lower gas prices. Yet the job market has weakened, grocery prices are squeezing Americans, and the gap between wealthy Americans and everyone else has been steadily growing. His speech turned rancorous at times, as he slammed Democrats and showed defiance toward a Supreme Court ruling that dealt him a major loss over his tariffs.
- In the Democratic response to the State of the Union, Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger slammed the president for his immigration actions and spoke about the killings by federal officers in Minneapolis and the children whose parents had been taken from them by ICE officers. Trump, she said, had “offered no real solutions to our nation’s pressing challenges — so many of which he is actively making worse.”