The White House's Dan Pfeiffer
promises "'A Very Special Episode' of the State of the Union" address tonight, in which President Obama will tell "a story" rather than provide a "laundry list of policies and ideas." Those policy ideas have been highlighted by speeches around the country by the president in the last few weeks, and will be included in the budget he'll send to Congress later this month. It would seem then that tonight will be his narrative for why he's pushing these policies. The White House released a few
excerpts of his speech as prepared and you can read them here.
5:50 PM PT:
White House says that Transportation @SecretaryFoxx is this evening's "Designated Survivor" of the Cabinet.
— @edatpost
5:51 PM PT:
How's @GOP's rebranding going?
FLOTUS invites TX DREAMer to be #SOTU guest.
@SteveKingIA calls her "deportable."
— @TUSK81
5:59 PM PT: If you'd like to follow along, or are more of a reader than a watcher/listener, here's the speech as prepared.
6:07 PM PT: POTUS is in the House.
6:08 PM PT:
6:12 PM PT: And President Obama begins, skipping the usual opening "The state of our union is...." Talking about the first 15 years of the new century and the difficulty that many still face. However, he says, "tonight, after a breakthrough year for America, our economy is growing and creating jobs at the fastest pace since 1999."
Shout out to Obamacare--"more of our people our insured than ever before."
6:13 PM PT: (In case you were wondering, Republicans didn't clap for health insurance.)
6:14 PM PT: "The shadow of crisis has passed, and the state of the union is strong." Growing economy, shrinking deficits... "we have risen from recession freer to write our own future than any other nation on Earth. It’s now up to us to choose who we want to be over the next fifteen years, and for decades to come."
6:15 PM PT: (In case you were wondering, Boehner & GOP don't stand for "the state of our nation is strong." They hate a good economy.)
6:18 PM PT: The economy, and a shout out to Rebekah and Ben Erler of Minneapolis, guests of First Lady Michelle Obama. Rebekah is one of the letter-writers that has been invited to the speech. "Rebekah and Ben's story is America's story... You are the reason I ran for this office. You’re the people I was thinking of six years ago today, in the darkest months of the crisis, when I stood on the steps of this Capitol and promised we would rebuild our economy on a new foundation. And it’s been your effort and resilience that has made it possible for our country to emerge stronger."
6:21 PM PT: Now he's touting Dodd-Frank along with Obamacare (no clapping from the GOP), focusing on the protections that middle America now has. "At every step, we were told our goals were misguided or too ambitious; that we would crush jobs and explode deficits. Instead, we’ve seen the fastest economic growth in over a decade, our deficits cut by two-thirds, a stock market that has doubled, and health care inflation at its lowest rate in fifty years." (GOP doesn't like that one, either.)
6:22 PM PT: "That's good news, people," to all the Republicans sitting on their hands.
Boom. "We can’t slow down businesses or put our economy at risk with government shutdowns or fiscal showdowns. We can’t put the security of families at risk by taking away their health insurance, or unraveling the new rules on Wall Street, or refighting past battles on immigration when we’ve got a system to fix. And if a bill comes to my desk that tries to do any of these things, it will earn my veto."
6:25 PM PT: This is the most pointed non-campaign Obama we've seen, taking Republicans on directly for their insistence on tearing down everything created on his watch. And adds: "We set up worker protections, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid to protect ourselves from the harshest adversity. We gave our citizens schools and colleges, infrastructure and the internet – tools they needed to go as far as their effort will take them."
6:27 PM PT (Barbara Morrill): New thread here.