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Good Friday Morning! Especially to all of you who sent me stories and pictures of George Santos at the State Of The Union last night. You really can’t make this stuff up. In terms of viral television/social media stakes, people are trying to make bigger and bigger scenes out of this event with each passing year. I hate that and partially want this to return to a report delivered to Congress.
But that won’t happen any time soon. Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy was on Fox News, and hearing his perspective on things was interesting. He told a story about how Bill Clinton looked back to Al Gore during a State of the Union and told him, “They’ve got last year’s speech in the teleprompter!” That forced Clinton to speak on the fly for a bit before it got fixed.
I’ll dive into Biden’s speech below and place it in context with what I’ve been writing about Democrats looking to push Biden out the door. Links will follow.
Quick Hits:
- On Thursday, TikTok launched a massive social media pressure campaign on Congress to get its users to call and complain about a bill that seeks to divest TikTok from China. Reports coming out of Capital Hill were bizarre: Teenagers calling and asking what a Congressman was, death threats, and more. The move backfired tremendously. The committee passed the bill unanimously, 50-0. That result shocked everyone covering it. Everyone on the committee, including all parties, was furious with TikTok’s stunt/propaganda campaign and saw it as a direct intervention by the CCP. Look for this to happen again, next week, when the House takes it up for a full vote. The White House has indicated it would sign such a bill.
- New York Governor Kathy Hochul has ordered 750 National Guard members into the New York subway system to help combat crime. In four years, we’ve gone from “Defund the police” to “Send in the troops.” Some of you may recall that Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) suggested that we use the troops to quell all try street riots in the summer of 2020. His op-ed was published in the NYT, which had staffers revolt over it, calling the publishing of that op-ed an “unsafe work environment.” The NYT Opinion Page Editor lost his job over that. One of the journalists who claimed the NYT made an unsafe environment was the same journalist responsible for writing the story on the National Guard getting sent into the subways for the NYT. Can’t make it up. Oh, and Tom Cotton saw that same piece…
Where you can find me this week
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Modern Progressives Learn They Can’t Reinvent Civilization – Conservative Institute
Trump Winning Is The 2024 Baseline Expectation – Conservative Institute
Biden’s Do-Or-Die Campaign Moment Has Arrived – Conservative Institute
Biden Fights Back Against Critics In His Own Party – For Now
Biden’s State Of The Union speech was on Thursday evening. I watched all of it to get a feel for how the White House would play the evening. As I’ve written in this newsletter and my Monday Conservative Institute column, this was a do-or-die moment for Biden and his campaign.
To judge a speech, you need to know its aim and go from there. Biden had one aim coming into Thursday night: look energetic and fiery and deliver one of his best speeches to keep his liberal wing satisfied. He’s fighting off more than six months of terrible polls and a growing belief within his party that he must step down.
MSNBC/NBC News Elections analyst Steve Kornacki did a segment this week discussing Biden and Trump’s bases for this election. He noted that Trump’s base was intact from 2020- 97% of those who voted for Trump in 2020 would do so again. Biden’s supporters were 85%. That’s enough of a difference to flip swing states.
Biden had to deliver a knockout to his base and present himself in a way that refuted the claims he’s an old man with a bad memory and can’t be prosecuted because of it. He also couldn’t look like he does in so many press conferences or speeches, where he’s in a haze and stumbling over everything.
Conservatives’ response to this speech is: “It was highly partisan and a campaign speech. It wasn’t a State of the Union speech.” That’s entirely correct. It was a stump speech aimed at his party, which needed him to deliver.
From my vantage point, he was able to deliver on that narrow point. What was odd about this speech, or stood out depending on your view, is how fast Biden spoke and how loud. Biden went to the podium and dove right into the speech, skipping the Speaker of the House introducing him. And he started talking a mile a minute (for him) and at full volume with the knob ripped off.
There was no cadence, variance, or anything. It was “old man yells at cloud” for 30-40 minutes before he lost steam, slowed down, and talked quietly. But he ramped back up by the end. It’s clear the White House prepped him to come out fast, strong, and assertive.
So, if you’re a Democrat, you’ve got what you need for now. You can point to this and say Biden has met the criteria you need to push through the 2024 cycle. This should, with emphasis on the word should, quiet down the soft campaign to get him to step down. Will that hold? Only time will tell.
That brings us to the second way to measure the State Of The Union: Will it move the general election needle?
On that point, I doubt it’ll have any impact at all. And it could hurt him. Biden went full-on red-meat speech for Democrats. He didn’t have anything if you were a centrist or a Republican. That was by design, of course.
It was interesting that he started the speech on Ukraine, but he didn’t get to Israel until he was deep into the speech. And from Ukraine and Putin, he dove into January 6, 2021. I understand that Democrats want to run on the “Democrats Is On the Ballot” line again. It’s not clear to me that it holds the same weight.
A recent CBS News poll found that “34 percent of voters think U.S. democracy and rule of law “will be safe” if Biden wins November’s election, while 33 percent said the same about Trump.”
That’s not a winning percentage on an issue to depend on to win an election.
The NYT/Siena College poll I cited in my Wednesday column found that 40 percent of voters said Mr. Trump’s policies had helped them personally, compared with just 18 percent who say the same about Mr. Biden’s policies. Instead, 43 percent of voters said Mr. Biden’s policies had hurt them, nearly double the share who said the same about Mr. Trump’s policies.”
On Super Tuesday, Nate Cohn noted, “New NYT/Siena troll: Trump led 74-23 in the Super Tuesday states in our last national poll, nailing his 74-23 in the actual popular vote so far.”
In other words, I wouldn’t doubt the accuracy of the NYT/Siena poll. They just drilled the primaries. So when they say Trump is leading the national polls by five points over Biden (48-43), I’d take that number seriously.
Biden’s issue is that he’s at 43%, and his base is unhappy with him. He’ll likely get something out of his State of the Union speech. But that still leaves the middle he has to start winning back.
Put another way, the speech has not changed the baseline for this race. As I wrote earlier this week, the baseline is simple — this is Trump’s race to lose. He has the momentum, the polling, and the right trend lines. That can all change; there are legal cases out there and more.
But Democrats are losing in the national polls. In the past, I’ve pointed to ways the polls could—and had been—wrong in Republican favor. Usually, when these things show Republicans leading, you have to take them seriously because they’re hard to find. Democrats are the ones looking for a polling error in their favor now.
Trump is leading, and Biden has a lot of ground to make up between now and the election. The State of the Union was the first positive step he’s taken towards that goal. The imminent threat from his party is gone for the moment. We’ll see how long that lasts as we approach the summer months.
Links of the week
How the Gaza Ministry of Health Fakes Casualty Numbers: The evidence is in their own poorly fabricated figures – Tablet Magazine
Biden’s Bridge to Nowhere – Matthew Continetti, WFB
Public Schoolers Are Paid $1,400 a Pop to Become Social Justice Warriors: A California activist group is using taxpayer money to reward teens for learning how to fight for ‘racial justice.’ – Francesca Block, The FP
No, Michelle Obama Is Not Going to Be the Democratic Nominee – Jim Geraghty, National Review
South Carolina becomes 29th state in nation with constitutional carry law: ‘Hard-fought victory’ – Fox News
X/Twitter Thread(s) of the week
Nate Cohn talking primary results versus polls.
Satire of the week
Kamala Harris Swaps Shifts At Orangetheory To Attend State Of The Union – Onion
‘I Know Him,’ Kamala Harris Whispers To Mike Johnson During State Of The Union – Onion
Marianne Williamson Successfully Primaries Biden In All 63 Counties Of Astral Plane – Onion
Biden Opens State Of The Union By Saying Hello To Dianne Feinstein – Babylon Bee
Woman Doesn’t Care About Members of the Royal Family Unless They Haven’t Been Seen for Two Months – Reductress
36-Year-Old Didn’t Expect to Have Entered the “Did You Hear Who Died?” Phase of Life Already – The Hard Times
Talent Agent Urges Struggling B-List Celeb To Maybe ‘Develop Some Mental Health Issues’ – Waterford Whispers News
Thanks for reading!