The State of the Union is the President’s opportunity to address the American people to let them know where the country is, where it is headed, and what its priorities are.
Biden entered today with the lowest unemployment rate since 1969, but Americans remain uncomfortable with the direction of the country. Two-thirds say he’s headed in the wrong direction. And the polls show that the majority disapprove of his work at the helm of the nation.
In his second State of the Union address, Biden began with the economy by mentioning that his administration had “created, with the help of many people in this room, 12 million new jobs, more jobs created in two years than than any president has created in four years.”
It was, between the lines, a reminder that he had reached the executive branch less than a year after almost 22 million jobs evaporated from the economy over two months (March and April 2020) due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
On the other hand, he emphasized the need to achieve bipartisan projects. “I’ve signed more than 300 bipartisan bills since I became president,” he said. He called for unity with Republicans to work together, especially after highlighting the progress that has been made in funding projects across the country through the infrastructure bill.
And he asked Congress to raise the debt ceiling. He recalled that his administration “cut the deficit by more than $1.7 trillion, the largest deficit reduction in the history of the United States.”
And he added: “Almost 25% of all the national debt that took more than 200 years to accumulate was added by a single administration, the last one. These are the facts, check it out. How did Congress respond to that? Doing the right thing. They raised the debt ceiling three times without preconditions or crises. They paid America’s bills to prevent an economic disaster in our country.”
“So tonight I ask this Congress to do the same. Let us commit here tonight that the full faith and credit of the United States of America will never, ever be questioned,” he said.
And he offered, again, an olive branch to the Republicans. “People sent us a clear message. Fighting for fighting’s sake, power for power’s sake, conflict for conflict’s sake, gets us nowhere,” he said. “That has always been my vision for the country: to restore the soul of the nation, to rebuild the backbone of America: the middle class. unite the country They have sent us here to finish the job.”
