Almost an hour into his speech, President Trump set his trap.
“One of the great things about the State of the Union,” he said, “is how it gives Americans the chance to see clearly what their representatives really believe.”
The Democrats — the ones who’d bothered to show up, anyway — stirred a little in their seats. What was he up to now?
“Tonight,” the president continued, “I’m inviting every legislator to join with my administration in reaffirming a fundamental principle. If you agree with this statement, then stand up and show your support: The first duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens.”
Democratic lawmakers stayed in their seats. This was obviously what Mr. Trump was hoping might happen. “You should be ashamed of yourself, not standing up,” he pronounced triumphantly. The Republican side of the room erupted on cue.
The architect of Mr. Trump’s aggressive immigration policy, Stephen Miller, made clear that the night’s performance had been built around this moment. “0 democrats stood for the foundational principle of all government that leaders must serve citizens before invaders,” Mr. Miller posted on X. “Never has there been a more stunning moment in Congress.”
With one maneuver, Mr. Trump divided the room, asking viewers to see the two camps as he saw them: There were the Good Americans and there were those willing to jeopardize the country’s security.
The president’s ploy changed the energy inside the House chamber. At that point, what had been a mostly dutiful State of the Union address morphed into full-blown political theater. It was part game show, part cage match — which is just how Mr. Trump likes it. When he wasn’t handing out medals to war veterans or tossing the spotlight to ice hockey players and victims of violent crimes perpetrated by immigrants, the president was slamming the Democrats as “sick,” America-hating, election-meddling thieves.
There wasn’t a lot of policy talk in Tuesday’s speech or much coherence when it came to foreign affairs. It was a night of stunts and special guests.
Mr. Trump introduced a young woman named Sage who is at the center of a lawsuit over how her school handled her gender identity. He used Sage’s story to do some political jujitsu on the Democratic side of the room.
“We must ban it, and we must ban it immediately,” he said of states recognizing gender transitions among young people without parental consent.
Again, the Democrats didn’t clap or get up. “Look,” Mr. Trump observed, “nobody stands up. These people are crazy, I’m telling you. They’re crazy. Amazing. Terrible. Boy, oh boy. We’re lucky we have a country, with people like this.”
But there were other energies charging the air in the House chamber, too.
Almost palpable was the growing sense in Washington that the Republicans will not be in control of that room by the time they all get together to do this number next year. If things keep going the way they are now, it won’t be Speaker Mike Johnson smiling serenely over Mr. Trump’s left shoulder.
A lot had changed since last year’s address by the president, made shortly after he barreled back into power and began overhauling the federal government. Sitting in the chamber, you could see what had changed.
Onetime Trump ally Marjorie Taylor Greene and her red MAGA hat were gone. So too were the sweet, sweet promises of DOGE and billionaire Elon Musk, who sat by the president’s children at last year’s address and got a standing ovation for the drastic cuts to federal agencies he was just starting to make.
Mr. Trump gave that speech 43 days into his second term. He was vesuvial then, flush with power, describing a grand imperial vision by which the United States would retake the Panama Canal and bring Greenland into its domain.
One year in, his foreign policy doctrine is decidedly unpopular with the American public. He kept it vague Tuesday night, offering no new explanations about the United States’ removal of Venezuela’s leader beyond the word “oil” (which caused the Republicans to roar). And there were no further insights as to why we may be on the verge of war with Iran.
Last year, he had promised an economic revolution led by tariffs. This year, he had to stare into the faces of some of the Supreme Court judges who took his favorite toy away from him. When he complained about the court’s decision — “very unfortunate ruling,” he called it — one Democrat yelled out to taunt him: “They’re right in front of you!”
But for the most part, the Democrats seemed less on edge than they did last year. Many didn’t come. The ones who did seemed kind of bored. Nancy Pelosi spent much of the night scrolling on her phone. Lauren Underwood got up and left.
Democrats, including Ms. Pelosi, did rise and clap for the president when he said that “we must totally reject political violence of any kind.” But then, in the same speech, he warned that Democrats steal elections, saying “they want to cheat, they have cheated,” which was exactly the kind of rhetoric that laid the groundwork five years ago for a pro-Trump mob to ransack the very building in which he was speaking.
This was but one of many contradictions on display in the House chamber Tuesday night.
It was the longest State of the Union address made by any president since the American Presidency Project began keeping records in 1964. But compared to last year’s, there was something quieter about it. The applause wasn’t the same, yet neither was the outrage. There were stunts, but what else?
After Mr. Trump spoke his last words — “God bless you, and God bless America” — Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. turned to three of the other Supremes and gave a curt little nod. They turned on their heels and filed out, one by one, right past the president as he leaned forward and started shaking hands.
Shawn McCreesh is a White House reporter for The Times covering the Trump administration.
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