President Donald Trump, typically an aggrieved orator, was in a cheery mood Tuesday night as he delivered the 2026 State of the Union address.
Over a record-breaking speech spanning nearly two hours, Trump chirped about how "hot" America has been over the 13 months since he returned to the White House. He bragged about what he saw as his administration's greatest accomplishments ("We ended DEI in America!"). He declared his inexplicably self-destructive tariff war a success, "paid for by foreign countries," while throwing in some of his patented lies about the 2020 election.
In one of the more memorable early moments of the speech, the president seemed to genuinely get a kick out of introducing members of the gold-medal-winning U.S. Olympic men's hockey team, surprising goaltender Connor Hellebuyck with a Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country's highest civilian honor.
And Trump lit up every time he heckled Democrats in the room, repeatedly calling them "sick people" and "crazy."
But his ebullient demeanor was in stark contrast to the content of much of his speech, which included racist rhetoric about Somalis, maximalist condemnations of the opposition party and a litany of violent imagery as he nodded to his invited guests — including family members of people killed by illegal immigrants.
This is a preview of Anthony J. Fisher's latest column. Read the full column here.
