‘State of the Union’: Upside-Down
Terry H. Schwadron
March 4, 2025
Despite Donald Trump’s address to Congress tonight of his “renewal of the American Dream,” what he sees as the ‘State of his Union’ is, charitably, upside-down.
Indeed, the hardest part of the night was matching often misleading boasts with verifiable deeds in Trump remake of America that is “just getting started.”
Even hardened Trump supporters are acknowledging that speed and sloppiness of Trump’s blitz campaigns to deport millions of migrants, slash federal spending and jobs, start a global trade war and abandon wartime ally Ukraine to turn U.S. foreign policy towards reconstituting relations with Russia are testing their expectations. A mark of our achievements: the sheer number of lawsuits being filed to challenge the deluge of Trump administration actions.
Turning the joint session of Congress into a campaign platform for his favorite themes was a reminder that Trump is a showman, but not a persuasive leader. He announces slogans with a very select ear for half-truths but cannot bringing new voters to follow through with more than lists and promises. The fact-checkers could go after almost every other paragraph.
The antipathy of Democrats was visible with signs and the ejection of Rep Al Green, D-Texas, for a shouted protest, while Republicans cheered at everything, including tariffs and moves that help Russia. On his “unity” theme, Trump made clear again that you are either with him or against him — with a steamroller then headed your way from a remade Justice Department or political attack group, even as he denounces “weaponized” prosecutions.
He wants us to believe that he is a strong force, a unique defender, to keep America from being seen as an embarrassment — while doing things that make us an embarrassment either in intention or in execution. To anyone beyond the Trump inner circle, the State of the Union is, well, uncertain, chaotic and worried.
The Messages
Listening to Trump’s 90-minute remarks, you would be hard pressed to know that the budget showdown in the next week could simply shut the government altogether or that his zeal to cut foreign aid is resulting in starvation in multiple countries. Trump targeted debt ceilings but singlehandedly raised debt by the most in U.S. history. In his tariff explanations, no one will pay higher prices, when financial markets and businesses are telling us the opposite. In his telling, there is no alternative to Congress — and the rest of us — doing whatever he wants.
As familiar as his themes at his messaging speech, using victims of selected crimes as justification for mass deportations, as he did, does not explain the roundup of so many without criminal records. As heartfelt his desire to trim federal spending, there was only bluster to explain the excesses of indiscriminate worker dismissals, overstated savings, and uncaring about the resulting chaos left by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
And as fixated as Trump is with forcing a deal between Ukraine and Russia, he offered nothing that explains his own mob boss-like behavior in holding a virtual gun to the head of Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy in shutting down military aid to force what amounts to surrender of 20 percent of its territory. Even in acknowledging a new gesture from Zelenskyy, there was nothing about guarantee of security against repeat aggression. There was nothing about Russian concessions, or even a thought about why Russia won’t continue fighting as the U.S. stands down from supplying ammunition. There was nothing about forgetting Europeans as friends in arms or explaining why security is an issue for Israel in the Middle East, but not Ukraine.
Not Addressed
What Trump did not address is his six weeks of undercutting other branches of government, seeking to control the military, the press, and cultural issues with sweeping, unchecked dictatorial powers to gain his American Dream. Rather, he used the pulpit to demand more power to substitute his judgments for Congress on budget and priorities.
He did not address lowering consumer prices, preferring to argue on behalf of the launch of tariffs against Mexico and Canada, our largest trade partners, and China. The countermeasures launched the same day, promising higher consumer prices to everyone not named Trump. As usual, if there is something going wrong, it is the fault of Joe Biden or Barack Obama a decade ago. He did not explain how steps taken by Mexico and Canada towards stopping fentanyl and migrants could have changed sufficiently in the three weeks he gave them before tariffs kicked in.
Instead, Trump bragged again about promised investments in American manufacturing which will take years to develop if at all. The stock market he so frequently touts was crashing over tariffs as he was talking. The promised dismissals of tens of thousands of federal employees and more from canceled federal contracts are about to send jobless numbers up substantially, and the combination of inflation and jobless hikes will result in higher lending rates. He called for eliminating toxins while he is eliminating the kind of people and regulations that govern toxins.
Trump praised Elon Musk and DOGE spending cuts towards eliminating regulations, agencies, and jobs to make budget room to make permanent the tax cuts from 2017 that benefit the wealthy and corporations, and for his own big spending plans to support the immigration roundup and deportation programs and a vast remake of military weaponry — even as he insists on stopping weapons for Ukraine.
As always, Trump’s self-praise included a healthy dose of anti-woke culture war spread. The congressional audience remained evenly split on strict partisan lines over the president’s insistence on promoting anti-trans comments as a top measure for American progress towards righting the ship. For Trump, anti-trans translates as pro-women, more than, say, backing measures for equal pay with men. Trump sees leadership as proclaiming things to be true that match his personal ideology, from views on diversity, equity and inclusion to preferences for plastic straws and toilet water flow.
By contrast, we heard nothing of note about expanding access to health while measles and flu spread, an increasingly important concern since Americans tie health coverage to jobs, or about taming gun violence or dealing with domestic terrorism and violence. The Union seems to depend on promoting the aspirations of its White, Christian, English-only population even as demographics of this pluralistic country are making Whites another minority.
For all the swagger, Trump’s national report card proved a poor mirror for what is happening on his watch.
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