This became clear less than 15 minutes into the speech, when Rep. Al Green (D-TX) stood up and began shouting at Trump that “you don’t have a mandate,” while brandishing a cane, as if determined to reenact the infamous caning of Charles Sumner from before the Civil War. However, it was Green himself who ended up caned – and canned – as a result of his outburst. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) had him removed from the chamber by the Sergeant-at-Arms shortly thereafter. And not only was this a rare occurrence and a pleasure to witness (at least for us), but it also seemed to take the fight out of the Democrats entirely. A few more shouts of impotent rage followed, but for the most part, the Democrats sat on their hands, or used them to brandish what appeared to be repurposed ping pong mallets bearing slogans like “Musk steals” and “FALSE.” These were immediately memed into jokes, as was the hilariously ghetto attempt by Rashida Tlaib to protest by holding up a miniature whiteboard bearing the words “start by paying your taxes,” like the world’s angriest substitute teacher.
Of course, some Democrats seemed to recognize what a disaster this kind of thing was optically, hence why House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) pleaded with his caucus not to make a scene, but to no avail. And while we don’t expect to say this often, it nonetheless remains true that Hakeem Jeffries was right about that. The spectacle of the Democrats impotently holding up angry, desperately-worded signs as Trump filleted the existing Washingtonian regime, like college kids who are too afraid to clap in case it triggers someone, was more devastating by far than if they’d simply stayed silent.
Which brings us, at last, to the speech itself. Frankly, with enemies like this, the speech could have been a snoozefest and Trump still would have won the night. But it most emphatically was not a snoozefest, and even though Trump held forth longer than any president ever has in a speech like this, breaking Bill Clinton’s previous record, the whole thing didn’t feel long at all. This was partially because Trump has finally gained a more than passing facility with using a teleprompter, which led to his best delivery of a pre-written speech yet. Rather than simply recite what was written, he let himself savor it. Probably the best moments came when he recited the litany of waste uncovered by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), during which time Trump would often pause and stare at the teleprompter in mock disbelief at what he was reading, before quirking a smile and delivering the zingers with all the standup-inflected dryness a New Yorker can muster. “This is real,” Trump marveled at one point, as if he couldn’t believe the words he was to deliver. One could call it Reaganesque, except Reagan’s sense of humor was never quite this scathing.
However, while Trump had many sarcastic barbs for the government’s wasted money, he wisely kept jibes at the expense of the opposing party mostly in reserve, though at one point he did point out that the Democrats wouldn’t applaud, even if he cured a life-threatening disease. “It’s very sad, and it shouldn’t be this way,” Trump sighed as he stared a line across the Democratic caucus. Then, he issued an uncharacteristically diplomatic plea: “Let’s work together and let’s truly make America great again.”
His words were not heeded. Indeed, the Democrats were so stubbornly silent that even when President Trump announced that he was granting a Secret Service badge to a 13-year-old boy with brain cancer, the Democrats still remained stubbornly silent. When they could stir themselves to make noise, it was either to howl at Trump’s readoff of the waste uncovered by DOGE, particularly in the realm of Social Security, another place where Trump’s newfound confidence with the teleprompter showed itself. After reciting a list of Social Security recipients with implausibly long ages, Trump paused and quipped, “we have a healthier country than I thought, Bobby” as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr cracked a smile.
But moreso than the showmanship of the speech, its ambition was breathtaking. As just a sample of his vision, Trump reiterated his desire to take back the Panama Canal, to annex Greenland, to end federal income tax in favor of revenue from tariffs, to balance the federal budget, and to radically reorient the United States’ trade policy toward reciprocity rather than subsidizing allies’ economies. Given that Trump’s tariff threats had spooked the stock market earlier that day, this last point was particularly important for Trump to message correctly, and he did so with one of the best lines in his speech: “Whatever they tax us, we will tax them.” Even inveterate free traders – who oppose tariffs on principle – would have a hard time arguing with that, seeing as it essentially amounts to using tariffs as a vehicle to destroy trade protectionism by other countries, rather than solely for our own sake.
We don’t just wax rhapsodic about the speech like this to flatter Trump, but rather to lead up to a point: against a vision this sweeping in its desire to reinvent, restore, and reorient much of American policy around the interest of American citizens – not to mention the laundry list of accomplishments which Trump mercilessly bludgeoned the Democrats with throughout the speech – only a party with an equally appealing rival vision would have even a prayer of success. But unfortunately for the Democrats, it is now clear that they’re not even halfway there. That became obvious when their “response,” delivered by Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), aired later that night.
Now, to be clear, delivering a speech like this is an extremely unenviable position for any politician, and has sunk many promising new faces in both parties. Being forgettable is the infinitely safer choice for anyone who comes up with this assignment. Unfortunately for Slotkin, however, while her Tracy Flick-style overzealous class president delivery was about as memorable as a fart in a wind tunnel (thus preserving her career), the substance of the speech was far more revealing. In fact, quite frankly, we were surprised it was a speech a Democrat was delivering at all. It sounded more like Slotkin had outsourced speechwriting duties to Bill Kristol, particularly when she said of President Trump that “in his heart, he doesn’t believe we’re an exceptional nation” because he wasn’t interested in pissing away further American blood and treasure on Ukraine. More bizarrely still, the only times in the speech when Slotkin – a former CIA officer – seemed to show any feeling were precisely the parts which attacked Trump for repudiating the old, discredited foreign policy establishment vision, in particular her bizarre declaration that “Trump would’ve lost us the Cold War.” Her lines on the economy – arguably the far more strategically sound turf -- were so canned that they could’ve been taken from any Democrat’s attack on a generic Republican, and sometimes were complete non sequiturs. For example, her claim that Musk “and his gang of 20-year-olds” wanted to destroy people’s retirements flew in the face of Trump’s previous pledge to make Social Security benefits nontaxable. It was like the Democrats had played mad libs with decades of old talking points where the economy was concerned, and had copied the Bush-Cheney 2004 campaign’s homework on foreign policy; in short, like a Kamala stump speech that had been microwaved past its sell-by date.
But perhaps sadder even than Slotkin’s attempt to resurrect attack lines and policy dogma that has been stale for years was the moment when she finally told people what to do about all the horrible things which President Trump was allegedly responsible for. And what did she say they should do about this supposedly horrible defiler, who wanted to lose us the Cold War and strip away our exceptional nature as a nation? Well, her advice was – ready for it – to start a club.
Yes, really. The only thing the Democrats can think of to tell people to do in the face of Trump’s election is basically…community organizing. Organizing for what? They wouldn’t say. How should such organizations become national level powers? No word there either. In truth, the only way they could’ve sounded any more impotent would be if they’d told Americans to write strongly worded letters to the White House. But even that might have been an improvement because at least then they’d have been forced to offer some suggestions for how to make those letters persuasive, if not to the White House, then to one’s fellow Americans. But the Democrats have no idea how to do even that. Because, while they may have chosen Slotkin as their acceptable face because she barely squeaked by in Michigan last year, their true face is Al Green: an old, angry man, waving a cane and fulminating impotently as a world he no longer recognizes passes him by. And, like Green, they have been thrown from the glow of power and cast into the political outer darkness by the American people. And we suppose that for them, there is at least this little consolation in their defenestration: The political wilderness is, indeed, a safe space.
