You would have learned more about American politics by observing the audience at Donald Trump’s speech to Congress on Tuesday (4 March) than by listening to what the president actually said. Trump was there to tout his achievements over his first 43 days in office. The Senate, the House of Representatives, his cabinet and the Supreme Court all gathered in the Capitol to hear him speak. Tens of millions of people were expected to tune in. But it was clear from the start that this event would descend into farce.
The Republicans were fixated on demonstrating unflinching loyalty. When Trump entered the chamber at 9.10pm the Republicans held up phones to take selfies with him as he walked down the aisle. Once he began speaking, there was a sense that the Republicans weren’t really listening to what the president was actually saying. Instead, they were waiting for their cues to applaud. Their synchronised clapping reached North Korean levels. Only the secretary of state Marco Rubio looked worn by the stormy diplomatic weather blowing across the Atlantic.
Throughout his wide-ranging address, which went on for an unprecedented hour and 40 minutes, Trump had little new to say on foreign policy. He acknowledged the conciliatory message that Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky had issued on social media hours earlier, following their Oval Office showdown on 28 February, before saying he’d also received “strong signals” from Vladimir Putin that he was ready for peace.
The president also reiterated his claim that the US would annex the Panama Canal, while issuing a message directly to Greenland, which he has repeatedly suggested the US would annex: “We strongly support your right to determine your own future, and if you choose, we welcome you into the United States of America,” he said, before adding, “I think we’re going to get it, one way or the other.”
He also addressed the tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China that had gone into effect earlier that day. In an acknowledgment of the negative market response, he said, “There’ll be a little disturbance. But we’re OK with that. It won’t be much.” The Republicans cheered along throughout.
As for the Democrats, they protested by holding up signs – signs! During a presidential address to a joint session of Congress! – one read “Save Medicaid”, another “Protect veterans”. American democracy has never felt more like a reality television show.
The Democrats had been told by the party’s leadership to play nice. That message was roundly ignored. The Democratic women’s caucus all dressed in pink because, as Representative Teresa Leger Fernández explained, “pink is a colour of power and protest”. Several members had brought federal employees who were sacked by Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) team to watch from the public gallery. In a country where a not insignificant number of voters think a paedophile ring is in charge, where even more view their leaders as venal egotists, and most think Washington is incredibly inefficient, trying to elicit sympathy for sacked government officials was an interesting tactic. The stunt summed up the Democrats’ bind: how to hold Trump to account while winning over the voters who like what he does.
Whatever the answer to that question is, it seemed to elude those in the audience last night. When Trump was listing the government spending Doge had cut to cheers from his side, one Democratic congresswoman brandished a sign that read “lies”. The Republicans were laughing because to them it was all a joke. In response, the Democrats shook their signs and held them even higher.
Meanwhile, Trump’s claim that “America is back” was met with chants of “U, S, A!” from Republicans, with one member shouting out “amen”. Many Democrats’ signs had the word “false” printed on the back, which they displayed in an effort to fact-check Trump’s speech. Yet they weren’t as robotically unified as the Republicans. When at one point Trump said there “are only two genders – male and female”, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar looked to her left and then to her right cautiously before turning her sign to read “false”. Politics was in flux.
But the star intervention came from the veteran Democratic congressman Al Green – the 78-year-old, wielding his walking stick in his hand, repeatedly rose to shout “you don’t have a mandate!”. “Arrest him!” one Republican cried before House security ushered him outside. An hour into Trump’s speech and more Democrats trickled out of the chamber voluntarily. In one bathetic moment, Representative Jasmine Crockett stood up, turned around to show off her T-shirt that said “Resist” and then proceeded to exit the chamber, largely unnoticed. It was never clear whether Democrats were leaving to protest the speech or because they were tired.
The result was a president who knew he didn’t need to do much to summon the dutiful adoration of his party, and an opposition party struggling to oppose the president with gimmicks. The reflection of one doleful congressional clerk was that decorum first vanished when Representative Joe Wilson shouted, “you lie!” at Barack Obama at the same event in 2009.
Since then things have only got worse.
[See also: Why Donald Trump embraced Andrew Tate]
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