A former congressman has torn into the president and his lackeys while defending Democrats’ decision not to stand during the State of the Union address.
Democrats stayed in their seats as President Trump delivered a rambling one-hour and 47-minute speech to both houses of Congress on Tuesday night. His speech was interspersed with whoops and chants of support from Republicans, while Democrats made their discontent known by refusing to join in—a fact that was quickly seized upon by Trump officials who accused them of lacking patriotism.
Lawmaker turned CNN pundit Bakari Sellers appeared on NewsNight with Abby Phillip alongside Brad Todd, Ken Cuccinelli, Ashley Allison, and Terry Moran to discuss the speech.
He offered a cutting rebuttal to Todd’s claim that “Democrats made a mistake in the hall tonight. They didn’t all uniformly rise up and cheer the hockey team. They didn’t all uniformly rise up and cheer the heroes in the gallery, and they should have stood and clapped with that statement.”
Sellers didn’t hold back. “First of all, I think the bar is in hell for Donald Trump,” he began. “I‘ve said it multiple times. I want to say it again. The president of the United States is aged, he‘s old, he‘s incompetent. His subjects and verbs, they fight often. He‘s not a great orator.
“I mean, there is nothing comparable to Barack Obama. There‘s nothing comparable to George W. Bush. There‘s nothing even comparable to Joe Biden in terms of oratory and what you saw tonight. So that‘s first.”
He went on to say Trump’s address had failed to hit the mark with Democrats not only because of his alleged inability to deliver it, but also because of the context within which it was given.
“The second thing is, I understand the pomp and circumstance of the State of the Union, but most Americans are beyond that. And look, okay, Democrats didn‘t stand up for this. They didn‘t clap for that. I didn‘t necessarily like [Rep.] Ilhan Omar shouting out during the speech.
“But what are we juxtaposing that against? We‘re juxtaposing that against Renee Good being murdered in the street. We‘re juxtaposing that against [Alex] Pretti dying, shot multiple times in the street.”
The administration’s immigration crackdown came to a devastating head in January, when agents in Minnesota shot and killed Good and Pretti, both 37. These deaths became flashpoints in the national conversation about Trump’s sprawling deportation push and mass deployment of federal agents on American streets.
“So yeah, I get it. Democrats didn‘t stand up when he said that line. But the fact is, Donald Trump is killing Americans. People are tired of the National Guard in their cities, in their streets, ICE, and Border Patrol.”
He then took aim at two of Trump’s top aides, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her de facto chief of staff Corey Lewandowski, saying they were “incompetent from the top down.”
Noem and her underling, Lewandowski, have long been rumored to be having an extra-marital affair. According to New York Magazine, a FEMA staffer previously called it “the worst-kept secret in D.C.”
“The showmanship is one thing, but the utter incompetence that people are feeling every day, I think that is what‘s going to win or rue the day,” Sellers said.
Among the indicators of discontent was Texas Rep. Al Green’s protest in the opening moments of the droning monologue. During the incident, Green held up a placard saying, “Black people aren’t apes,” in reference to a racist video posted on Trump’s social media account featuring the faces of Barack and Michelle Obama superimposed onto the bodies of apes.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
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