WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — President Donald Trump declared America “bigger, better, richer, and stronger than ever before” on Tuesday night in his annual State of the Union address, painting a glowing picture of his record while sharply attacking Democrats and laying out several priorities for the year ahead.
After touting the impending 250th anniversary of the United States, Trump declared that “after just one year, I can say with dignity and pride that we have achieved a transformation like no one has ever seen before, and a turnaround for the ages,” citing border security, a “restored” U.S. spirit, strengthened law enforcement, a lowered murder rate, and various favorable economic numbers (which have been disputed).
As would be expected, illegal immigration factored prominently into the president’s remarks, with Trump highlighting the families of crime victims in attendance and calling on Congress to both crack down on sanctuary cities and pass a proposed “Delilah’s Law” that would forbid states from issuing driver’s licenses to illegals. Also addressed, but not as stridently as some feared, was the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling last week striking down a significant portion of his signature tariffs, which he called “very unfortunate” while minimizing the practical implications.
He also touted the tax cuts in last year’s Big Beautiful Bill, along with the elimination of many economic regulations, took credit for confronting the “crushing cost of healthcare,” and assured Americans concerned about his administration’s closeness to artificial intelligence companies that he negotiated a commitment from them to take responsibility for their new data centers’ energy requirements in such a way as would not make the general public foot higher energy bills. He called on Congress to pass the SAVE Act, containing various federal election-integrity measures.
Trump also addressed social issues at multiple points, mostly in ways favorable to social conservatives but with one caveat. “We ended DEI in America,” he declared, highlighting guests Michele Blair and her daughter Sage, who faced a harrowing ordeal when a Virginia high school socially-transitioned her without her parents’ knowledge or consent.
“But surely, we can all agree no state can be allowed to rip children from their parents arms and transition them to a new gender against the parents’ will,” Trump said. “Who would believe that we’ve been talking about that? We must ban it and we must ban it immediately. Look, nobody stands up,” he added, gesturing to the Democrat side of the audience. “These people are crazy. I’m telling you, they’re crazy … We’re lucky we have a country with people like this.”
“I’m very proud to say that during my time in office, both the first four years and in particular this last year, there has been a tremendous renewal in religion, faith, Christianity and belief in God, tremendous renewal,” Trump claimed. “This is especially true among young people, and a big part of that had to do with my great friend Charlie Kirk, a great guy, great man. So, last year Charlie was violently murdered by an assassin and martyred, really martyred for his beliefs. His wonderful wife Erika is with us tonight. Erika, please stand. Thank you, Erika, been through a lot. In Charlie’s memory, we must all come together to reaffirm that America is one nation under God, and we must totally reject political violence of any kind. We love religion and we love bringing it back and it’s coming back at levels that nobody actually thought possible.”
However, in the course of discussing the various ways his administration was working on cost-of-living issues, Trump also reiterated his support for the embryo-destructive in vitro fertilization (IVF) industry. “And here tonight is the very first customer ever to get that big discount, and it is big, Catherine Rayner,” he said. “For five years, she and her husband have struggled with infertility and they turned to IVF. One drug has been costing Catherine $4,000 to purchase. But a few weeks ago, she logged on to the website and got that same drug that cost costs $4,000, got it for under $500, a reduction of much more actually than $3,500. Catherine, we are all praying for you and you’re going to be a great mom.”
On international relations, the president reiterated his popular recurring claim to have ended eight wars across the globe, the details of which are disputed, while arguably the biggest war on the global stage, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, remains unended, and the prospect of further military action against Iran looms. Trump said his administration was “in negotiations” with the Islamist authoritarian state, but has not yet secured a commitment from them to stop seeking nuclear weapons – something Trump said he would never allow, despite his preference for diplomacy.
“As president, I will make peace wherever I can,” he said, “but I will never hesitate to confront threats to America wherever we must.”
The speech ultimately clocked in at 1 hour and 47 minutes, becoming the longest State of the Union address in American history.