Stating his case
IN TRUMPIAN STYLE, PREZ URGES UNITY YET PUSHES DIVISIVE POLICIES
President Trump urged political unity Tuesday night in his second State of the Union speech, but only on his terms.
The President repeatedly called for across-the-aisle cooperation while refusing to budge an inch on his demand for a border wall — the cause of a month long government standstill — and trashed Democratic oversight of his scandal-plagued administration.
“Millions of our fellow citizens are watching us now gathered in this great chamber hoping that we will govern not as two parties but as one nation,” Trump said after violating tradition of allowing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to first introduce him.
“There is a new opportunity in American politics if only we have the courage together to seize it. Victory is not winning for our party. Victory is winning for our country.”
The President touted an economic “boom” under his administration as proof of the “strong” state of the union, taking credit for historic job growth and low unemployment rates.
But he contrasted his uncharacteristic calls for cooperation by flogging his most divisive talking points — wall cash and the southern border “crisis” — claims disputed by Democrats as partisan, fact-challenged cudgels to justify his border barrier obsession.
“In the past, most of the people in this room voted for a wall, but the proper wall never got built,” Trump said, mischaracterizing some Democratic support for building a border fence in 2006. “Simply put, walls work and walls save lives.”
He also took shots at Democrats and special counsel Robert Mueller, claiming their investigations into his embattled administration and campaign are preventing “an economic miracle.”
“The only thing that can stop it are foolish wars, politics or ridiculous partisan investigations,” Trump said to cheers from the assembled Republicans.
Despite repeating fearmongering claims about undocumented immigrants, Trump stopped short of declaring a national emer- gency. It had been widely speculated he was going to use the esteemed event to make the declaration, which legal experts argue would invariably be struck down in court.
At the same time, he wouldn’t completely rule out declaring emergency, as the nation appears headed for a second government shutdown in as many months, with Congress unable to coax the President out of his demand for at least $5.7 billion in wall cash.
“I will get it built,” he said of the wall.
Trump was almost finished with his 90-minutelong address before announcing a second summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un in Vietnam on Feb. 27 and 28.
The unexpected announcement comes amid reports that the isolated Communist regime has continued to develop nuclear weapons in secret despite Trump’s claims of success following his last summit with Kim.
Beyond the wall and Kim, Trump used his speech to make a case for overhauling “calamitous” trade deals, launching sweeping infrastructure initiatives and making health care affordable. The President made nearly identical pleas in his 2018 State of the Union when Republican controlled both houses of Congress, but few — if any — of his stated goals materialized.
With a Democratic controlled House, those goals seem less likely, regardless of Trump’s urging.
Led by Pelosi (D-Calif.), dozens of female Democratic lawmakers wore white, suffragette-styled clothes for the speech and remained seated with the still hands as their Republican colleagues rose for standing ovations throughout the President’s address.
Democrats from both chambers also used their plus-one invitations to take veiled shots at Trump and what they view as his hypocritical immigration agenda.
Victorina Morales — an undocumented immigrant who until recently worked at Trump’s Garden State golf club — was invited to attend the event by Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.).
Originally from Guatemala, Morales says supervisors at the Trump club subjected her to abuse and set her up with fraudulent work documents — allegations that have garnered the attention of both federal and state investigators, as first reported by the Daily News.
Morales’ attorney, Anibal Romero, also attended Trump’s speech and said he would like to tell the President face-to-face what a “decent,” hardworking woman his client is. “As he knows, because the Trump Organization employed her,” Romero told The News.
Trump’s State of the Union address came as a large chunk of the government remains open with temporary funding following the longest federal shutdown in American history.
After 35 days, Trump agreed last month to reopen the shuttered agencies and Cabinet departments through Feb. 15 in order to give Congress time to hash out full-year spending.
But lawmakers are scrambling to come up with a longterm solution ahead of the deadline, as Democrats remain almost unanimously against the wall Trump promised Mexico would pay for, while the President made all but certain in his Tuesday speech he won’t sign any spending package that doesn’t earmark cash for his coveted barrier.
Trump’s address was followed by a stinging rebuttal from Stacey Abrams, the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia whose loss remains a point of contention over allegations that Republican Brian Kemp suppressed the state’s African-American vote.
Abrams, who was the first black woman to ever deliver a State of the Union rebuttal, unloaded on Trump over the recent shutdown.
“The shutdown was a stunt engineered by the President of the United States, one that defied every tenet of fairness and abandoned not just our people, but our values,” Abrams said, speaking from Atlanta.
Some 800,000 federal workers went without pay because of the shutdown. Many of them are nervous, as another shutdown appears likely to take effect in 10 days, unless Trump gives up his wall or Dems agree to bankroll it.
Democrats have offered a sweeping border security package that would provide funds to hire hundreds of new border agents, beef up drug and illegal crossing detection technology and repair existing fencing.
The Dem proposal notably lacks any wall cash.