In the longest address of its kind before Congress in recent memory, President Trump laid out his policy objectives on the economy, immigration, foreign policy & other topics. He was repeatedly critical of Democrats & his predecessor, Joe Biden. One Democratic congressman was escorted out of the House chamber after heckling Trump, and the Democratic Party's response delivered by Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) largely discussed how her party differs with Trump on economic and foreign policy issues.Read NPR's fact-check of President Trump's speech.This episode: political correspondent Sarah McCammon, White House correspondent Asma Khalid, and political correspondent Susan Davis.The podcast is produced by Bria Suggs & Kelli Wessinger and edited by Casey Morell. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.Listen to every episode of the NPR Politics Podcast sponsor-free, unlock access to bonus episodes with more from the NPR Politics team, and support public media when you sign up for The NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Chapter 1: Who are the key speakers in Trump's address to Congress?
Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Sarah McCammon. I cover politics. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House. And I'm Susan Davis. I cover politics. It is 1147 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, March 4, 2025. And earlier tonight, President Trump gave a joint address to Congress.
As soon as the president arrived in the House chamber, the tone and tenor of things was noticeably different than many previous similar speeches. Republicans gave Trump a standing ovation and chanted USA as he approached the lectern. Some Democrats skipped the event altogether, and those who were there were largely silent and seated. That is, until the speech started.
Chapter 2: What happened during the disruption in Trump's speech?
Mr. Green, take your seat. Take your seat, sir. Take your seat. Finding that members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum, the chair now directs the sergeant at arms to restore order. Remove this gentleman from the chamber.
So that was early on in Trump's speech when House Speaker Mike Johnson directed the sergeant at arms to remove Congressman Al Green, a Democrat from Texas, from the chamber for interrupting Trump after Trump said he and Republicans had won a mandate to govern. This was quite a moment, wasn't it?
Yeah, look, I don't think that interruptions of the president during a speech like this, a State of the Union or a joint address, are that atypical anymore. I think going back to Barack Obama's presidency where Congressman Joe Wilson of South Carolina very famously shouted, you lie at him. And that was a moment that was seen as sort of breaking with historical decorum.
But I got to say, ever since then, it's almost been a bit of a feature of these events to have some element of the minority party, for lack of a better word, heckle, where I think that Al Green took it to a new level was he refused to stop, that he interrupted the proceedings and actually led to the sergeant at arms, which is sort of the law enforcement body of the House of Representatives, to remove a congressman.
I can't say that's never happened before, but in my recollection, at least of the modern era, I can't recall any instance of that are happening. Sometimes there's been protesters up in the galleys that have been taken out by security. But for a member of Congress to disrupt was a bit of a surprise.
I would also note that Al Green is someone who has been a very loud Trump critic since his first term. He was one of the first lawmakers to introduce articles of impeachment against Trump in his first term. So it didn't necessarily surprise me that he was the type of lawmaker leading that kind of charge.
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Chapter 3: How did Democrats respond to Trump's address?
It also struck me that Democrats are really struggling in this moment with just how to articulate a response to President Trump. After he was escorted out of the chamber, he made a stop at the White House traveling press hold. And we got a pool note saying that he was explicitly yelling no mandate because he was referring to the no mandates to cut Medicaid.
And he said it's worth letting people know that there were some folks willing to stand up for that issue. Again, it's pointing to the fact that, you know, Democrats in the chamber, outside the We're all trying to figure out the best way to show opposition in this moment. I don't think they've come to any agreement on how to do that.
Yeah. And, you know, some of the Democrats were holding up these preprinted protest signs. They came ready with them that read Musk steals, protect veterans, save Medicaid. And then Trump responded to this big moment by speaking to Democrats directly.
So Democrats sitting before me. For just this one night, why not join us in celebrating so many incredible wins for America? For the good of our nation, let's work together and let's truly make America great again.
Chapter 4: What claims did Trump make during his speech?
So after that initial commotion, the rest of Trump's speech read kind of like a laundry list of areas where he is claiming victory so far. Some of Trump's claims, like eliminating fraudulent Social Security spending for people over the age of 150, something he's talked about before that's been debunked repeatedly.
And we should mention NPR's team of reporters fact-checked the address in real time, and we have a link to that in our show notes. You know, Asma and Sue, what else stood out to you?
I think what stood out to me was that oftentimes this first joint address to Congress for a new president is about laying out an agenda. Now keep in mind Donald Trump is not entirely a new president but he's done a lot in the six weeks he's been in office and he went through all of that. He's frozen foreign aid. He's withdrawn from the World Health Organization.
He's made English an official language. But my point in laying all this out is that he's done a lot. And so a lot of this speech was actually articulating some of the things he's done. And he leaned heavily into the culture war issues. You saw this with his focus on trans issues, his focus on immigration and the border. These are places he feels really comfortable.
But what we did not hear much of in this speech, and it sort of surprised me, was his plan to tackle inflation and high prices. Trump has said that he won this election because of two main issues, the border and high grocery prices. He talked a lot about the border. We did not hear a whole lot about his plan to deal with grocery prices.
Yeah, I think so much of it was classic Trump and it felt very reminiscent of his style on the campaign trail. I think it was maybe a little bit more base focus than I might have expected in a dress like this to be because it's one of those moments where you might actually have an audience that isn't just the party faithful.
But Trump will willfully repeat things that are just wrong or make promises that are just not true.
Sarah, you referenced the Social Security one, which I think that's an important point because this is the president using an address like this to repeat something that is just absolutely not true, suggesting that dead people and people over the age of 100 are collecting Social Security payments illegally. It's just not happening.
And to use a platform like that, to repeat that, I think tells you a lot about the universe that Trump lives in. I also think he makes claims like my administration is going to balance the federal budget. Absolutely no plan on the table offers any path to balancing the budget. But it was a bit of an echo chamber speech to me.
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Chapter 5: How did Trump's speech address economic issues like tariffs?
Yeah. But also, I think today is a great example about how Trump's rhetoric doesn't live in a vacuum. You know, they announced new tariffs and the result of that was stock markets have been very volatile. And today there was major drops in the stock market.
And then immediately you see people like Commerce Secretary Howard Letnick coming out and saying, oh, we might walk back some of those tariffs we just announced. And Trump just injects a ton of uncertainty into the economy and the economy likes certainty. So I think that Trump is trying to do two things right.
which is somehow take a lot of credit and grow the American economy, but single-handedly being the source of so much uncertainty that makes it very difficult to predict what's going to happen.
Well, another source of that uncertainty for many people is the way that Trump and Elon Musk, who has become part of his inner circle – are reshaping the federal government through Doge. Trump talked about that. He touted that as one of his accomplishments. What did you hear from Trump about what Doge has done so far?
No longer unelected bureaucrats are going to be running things. And then later is like, and there's Elon Musk up there, an unelected bureaucrat making profound changes to the federal government. I'm sorry. I just had to I had to see the irony in that moment. Look, I think Musk is a singularly fascinating and powerful figure in American politics right now.
And I also thought it was notable that Trump very obviously gives him credit for running the Doge effort while at the same time his administration is arguing in court that that Musk isn't technically in charge of it. So, again, creating some murkiness there.
And, you know, another big theme from Trump tonight and forever is immigration. He took up more than 10 minutes talking about that in this speech. He said his administration, quote, launched the most sweeping border and immigration crackdown in American history. Asma, what did you hear there?
Look, immigration has long been, I would argue, Donald Trump's favorite political issue. It is a place he feels very comfortable speaking of. And he talks about the fact that he won in part, major part, because of the border. And it is true that encounters at the border have decreased rather substantially, I believe, over the last month. So this is a place where he can point to a political win.
Thank you very much. And, you know, part of when you look at who's the guest that a president often invites, it's about humanizing and giving a human face to a president's top priorities. And this is a place which he feels very comfortable on. It is a place in which he believes he can point to actual like data wins and showing that there have been drops and encounters at the border.
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Chapter 6: What role does Elon Musk play in Trump's administration?
He was not here delivering sort of a grand vision of peace when it comes to Ukraine and Russia, because that's not what he has on his hands. I mean, he he said that Zelensky seems open to some sorts of negotiation and referenced a letter that he has received from from Ukraine's president. But really substantively, there wasn't a whole lot new about Ukraine.
Look, I will say that one of the things I think Trump is doing that could hurt him politically is let's go back to the top, right? He says he believes he has a mandate. But reality is he won by a smaller margin than Joe Biden did or Barack Obama did before him. Like the mandate thing is very questionable. And I do think when Trump spends time talking about things like the U.S.
is going to welcome Greenland if they want to be part of our country, and we're going to take back Panama Canal. Like, I'm not sure that Trump won this election because American voters had some grand new idea of Manifest Destiny. I think that they wanted economic relief. And you could argue they wanted to put the brakes on what they saw as some leftward lurching in society of cultural issues.
But he can kind of talk about things that I think move the ball. And right now, when you're a president that's ultimately not that popular, right? that stuff's risky, where it looks like you're focusing on stuff that is not the reason why people elected you.
And I think he's on much firmer footing when he's talking about things like immigration and also talking about things like trying to lower energy prices or, you know, the cost of eggs.
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Chapter 7: How did Trump emphasize immigration in his address?
But as we also talked about earlier this week on the podcast, Trump doesn't have to run free election. It's almost two years until the midterms. And he seems to be happiest playing to his base. And I think we saw During that speech, just how supportive his party was, even as, you know, the other side of the aisle was very silent. All right, it's time for a quick break.
And when we come back, the Democrats' response to the president's address.
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And we're back. As is tradition with these early joint addresses or State of the Union addresses, the minority party delivers an official party response. That came from Michigan Senator Alyssa Slotkin, who had the job for Democrats this year. Sue, just tell us a little bit about Slotkin. Why was she the choice for the rebuttal?
Well, she's been, since she first arrived in Congress, I think seen as a bit of a rising star. And I think her choice has a lot of symbolism to it. She was first elected to the House in the 2018 midterm wave that was seen as a backlash towards the first term of the Trump presidency and part of a crop of women that were elected in that class.
And then in this most recent election, she won the Senate race in Michigan. And she won it narrowly, but she won in a state that Donald Trump carried as well. So I think that the Democratic Party, as they seek to find the right messengers and the right leaders right now.
Picking her tells you that that's the type of person that they're trying to appeal to, a Democrat that can win over Trump voters, because that was her path to election. And I thought it was pretty interesting because her speech was, I think, It felt shorter than a lot of the rebuttals. It felt more focused. And I think that, you know, we've talked about this before in the podcast.
These speeches can often be a bit of a jinx or become a parody. And I think she was successful in like not doing anything that seemed like it was obvious that it was going to be parodied on Saturday Night Live this weekend. I think she did a perfectly acceptable job for what the job is.
Yeah, I mean, she was pretty laser focused on this message that Trump is essentially Trump has made all of these promises, but he's not going to be able to deliver on them, especially when it comes to improving the economy.
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