President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address drew in a reported 23 million viewers on Tuesday night. Americans who tuned in got a chance to hear directly from the president about the work he and his administration have done and his vision for the future.
But while Biden’s address was mostly optimistic and unifying, it also highlighted the widening hostile divisions between Democrats and Republicans. Throughout the president’s speech, some Republican members of Congress heckled and booed him and, at times, Biden paused to engage them.
Democratic National Committee chairman Jaime Harrison, who was a guest at the address, told theGrio that the behavior of Republicans was “embarrassing” to the nation.
“Three-year-olds are on better behavior than some of the members of Congress. It was just disparaging to the honor and the dignity of the House of Representatives,” said Harrison. “That is not why people go to the polls and send them there to Washington, D.C. to represent them.”
During his speech, Biden sought to compare and contrast his economic plan to that of some Republicans. But when he asserted that some Republicans have proposed terminating Social Security and Medicare as a plan to reduce the national deficit (and as a bargaining tool to raise the debt limit), some GOP lawmakers quickly heckled him — most notably Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, who yelled “liar!”
“I enjoy conversion,” quipped Biden, appearing to get Republicans to publicly state for the record that they will not seek to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits. According to a Gallup poll, Americans overwhelmingly reject such cuts.
Harrison said the exchange between Biden and Republicans created a moment of political strength for the president. “You could see very much that while they were playing tic-tac-toe, the president of the United States was playing chess. I mean, he set a mousetrap for these folks,” said the national Democratic leader.
Though Republicans pushed back against the suggestion that they have proposed to cut Medicare and Social Security services, Harrison said, “We have the receipts,” calling out Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, who in 2010 said Republicans would “phase out Social Security … pull it up by the roots, and get rid of it.”
The DNC chair also cited Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, who last year released his “11 Point Plan to Save America,” which also threatened to make cuts to the social spending programs.
“[Senator] Lindsey Graham has talked about entitlement reform and how we cannot allow Social Security and Medicare to exist in its [their] current form. So they’ve been talking about it,” said Harrison. “We saw the biggest demonstration of hypocrisy [on Tuesday night]. But the president just set a mousetrap for them. He put a little cheese there, a little cheese there and then he said, ‘I gotcha.’
He continued: “They all declared on the floor that they were not touching Social Security, that they were not touching Medicare … That’s a big win. Not for Joe Biden, but for the American people and our seniors.”
Instead of making cuts to popular programs like Social Security and Medicare, Biden and Democrats have proposed taxing billionaires and big corporations, who benefit from tax loopholes and pay little to no federal taxes.
During the address, Biden also laid out what he has accomplished in terms of his economic policies, like passing the Inflation Reduction Act — designed to lower health and energy costs for Americans — and creating a record 12 million jobs in two years. The U.S. unemployment rate is also the lowest it has been since 1969.
“These are huge things and huge milestones for us that we need to celebrate,” said Harrison.
Immediately after Tuesday’s State of the Union address, the president and administration officials hit the road to promote his message of accomplishment and progress. On Wednesday, Biden traveled to Wisconsin and on Thursday he will be in Florida. Ironically, while in Tampa, the president will discuss his plan to protect and strengthen Social Security and Medicare as well as lower healthcare costs.
Harrison stressed that Democrats have to continue making the case to the American public that the economic successes are because of Biden and Harris as well as the Democratic majority in the last session of Congress, resulting from the 2020 presidential election.
“As a result of their [American public] going out to vote, we are now able to make things better for them and their families in their communities,” said Harrison. “And so we got to connect those dots for a lot of people because otherwise, they don’t know.”
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