Transcript: Swamp Notes — Did Biden’s State of the Union hit the mark?

This is an audio transcript of the FT News Briefing podcast episode: Swamp Notes — Did Biden’s State of the Union hit the mark?

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Marc Filippino
For most of early American history, the president delivered his State of the Union address to Congress by written report — no need for pomp and circumstance. But these days, the annual address looks a little different.

News clip
Mr Speaker, the president of the United States.

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Marc Filippino
This is Swamp Notes, the weekly podcast from the FT News Briefing, where we talk about all of the things happening in the 2024 US presidential election. I’m Marc Filippino, and this week we’re asking: did President Biden’s State of the Union move the needle?

Here with me to discuss is Ed Luce. He’s the FT’s US national editor and columnist, and he’s the co-author of the Swamp Notes newsletter. Hey, Ed.

Edward Luce
Good to be with you.

Marc Filippino
And we’ve also got Steff Chávez, the FT’s Washington reporter, who’s writing our brand-new US Election Countdown newsletter. She’s right off the plane from Chicago and DC. Hey, Steff.

Steff Chávez
Hi, Marc. How are you?

Marc Filippino
I’m doing all right. Probably less tired than you are. So I really appreciate you being here.

Steff Chávez
Of course.

Marc Filippino
So we’re talking the morning after the State of the Union on Friday. And, Ed, before we dive into this, the content of the speech, have you ever seen a State of the Union address like the one that we saw last night?

Edward Luce
No. I mean, it’s a good question. A lot of them are forgettable because they’re laundry lists of presidents’ legislative agenda. Biden’s in particular have been quite forgettable. Last night was unforgettable. Not just because of the moment, which is the worst possible polling numbers that Biden’s had since he became president, but also because it was a campaign State of the Union. This wasn’t a laundry list. This was the kick-off, really, of his 2024 campaign, and he spoke with the sort of energy of a politician on the campaign trail. So it was very, very different beast to your, to your run-of-the-mill State of the Union, most of which do get instantly forgotten. This one won’t be forgotten.

Steff Chávez
And I think that another way it sounded like a campaign speech was he was heckled multiple times by Republicans in the audience, and he engaged with them.

Joe Biden voice clip
The result was a bipartisan bill with the toughest set of border security reforms we’ve ever seen. [Heckling]

Oh, you don’t think so?

Oh, you don’t like that bill, huh?

Steff Chávez
It had a little bit of edge, like a campaign rally, even though it was, you know, people who don’t support him talking to him.

Marc Filippino
And the fact that he mentioned his predecessor maybe 12 or 13 times, I mean, that had a real campaign feel to it.

Edward Luce
It did. I mean, it’s not what normally happens in the State of the Union. There are these sort of hallowed traditions that Biden, I think, probably well-advisedly dispensed with last night. It was extraordinary, though, watching just the sort of level of hostility from the Republicans. And also, you know, the number of times there was yelling from that side of the house. It’s been happening gradually over the last 10, 15 years. Obama suffered from people shouting, but it’s just got worse. And last night, I think, was the sort of least bipartisan State of the Union I have ever seen.

Marc Filippino
The non-reactions were in some ways even louder than the yelling, though. I mean, the fact that Republicans did not respond to a lot of the stuff that seemed like very easily bipartisan issues was fairly striking.

Steff Chávez
Definitely. And you know, that cameras always trained on Biden and vice-president Kamala Harris and Speaker of the House Mike Johnson. And Mike Johnson, by my count, stood up maybe only twice when he was clapping. And there were things that Biden was saying that you would think Republicans could get on board with. It’s just interesting that he couldn’t even get kind of, you know, the polite clapping of very simple things that actually do jibe with their messaging as well.

Marc Filippino
Yeah, let’s talk about those issues. This week is in many ways kind of kicked off the campaign season. Steff, the outcome of Super Tuesday basically means we’re in the general election because Trump’s main challenger, Nikki Haley, dropped out afterward. What did we learn the other night about the issues that will be driving Biden’s campaign when he spoke on Thursday night?

Steff Chávez
I mean, I think the border is gonna be front and centre. He again pushed for Congress to pass the bipartisan border and security deal that they negotiated recently that, you know, apparently Trump doesn’t really want to pass through so he can keep campaigning on the issue. I think reproductive rights are gonna be front and centre, and I think reproductive rights is gonna be, you know, an issue that the Democrats are really gonna try to energise their base with.

Joe Biden voice clip
Many of you in this chamber and my predecessor are promising to pass a national ban on reproductive freedom. My God, what freedom else would you take away?

Steff Chávez
Biden addressed the Supreme Court directly, which is very unusual. He told the justices: With all due respect, justices . . . 

Joe Biden voice clip
Women are not without electoral, electoral power. Excuse me. Electoral or political power.

Steff Chávez
You’re about to realise just how much . . . So that’s clearly a campaign moment for him.

Marc Filippino
The State of the Union represents this great opportunity for the president, regardless of who it is, to put their political opponents on the record in real time. And we can learn a lot about what the other party is thinking based on which lines they clap for. We’ve talked about this a little bit, but I think one of the most revealing things came during the response to the State of the Union, when the party not in power has a chance to rebut the State of the Union. Ed, Steff, what was your reaction to that response?

Steff Chávez
Yeah. So I did watch Katie Britt deliver the GOP response. She is a very young female senator from Alabama. She is the mother of two young kids, and she talked about that a lot.

Katie Britt voice clip
We are the party of hardworking parents and families, and we want to give you and your children the opportunities to thrive, and we want families to grow. It’s why we . . . 

Steff Chávez
And family values are that kind of core conservative value that, you know, Reagan-style Republicanism that we haven’t really been seeing since Trump entered the conversation. I think it was a very interesting choice, particularly because they’re very clearly trying to appeal to women voters in general and young voters as well. And then, of course, that cross section of young women voters. We have to remember that even though Trump swept almost all of the initial contests, he did not win by the expected margin. Nikki Haley did pull a lot of votes in some of those primaries, and she represents that more traditional conservative kind of Reagan-esque view in the Republican party. So I think they were also, you know, just trying to remind Republicans that they, like, have women in their party and like, they want those women votes, because Biden wants Nikki Haley’s votes. I think he sees them as potentially grabbable. And I think the Republicans are probably gonna want to try to keep them as well.

Edward Luce
Well, I can’t remember. I was so riveted by what I think was sort of this real-time ghastly screw-up by Senator Britt sitting there in her kitchen in Alabama like a sort of traditional housewife with clearly deliberate sort of imagery there, and this sort of staged whispery voice in all the wrong moments.

Katie Britt voice clip
Fulfil your oath of office, reverse your policies, end this crisis and stop the suffering.

Edward Luce
This was truly awful. And it was also sort of unintentionally just entertainment. I couldn’t stop laughing.

Marc Filippino
At a few points last night, the Democratic side of the aisle in Congress broke out into chants of four more years. If you’re a Democrat or a Democratic voter who was feeling apprehensive about Biden and his ability to campaign for president, either on the issues or his age, how are you feeling now post-State of the Union?

Edward Luce
Great relief, I think, was the first sort of emotion and then something over and above that, because Biden cleared the very low bar, but he cleared it very, very . . . in a very punchy way. Now, he’s still an 81-year-old president who can mangle sentences very easily. So it was, I think, a very powerful State of the Union address. And it answered Biden’s critics that he lacks vitality and energy, but it could be undone. It can be erased by a viral moment that conveys his age. So he has to sustain this.

Marc Filippino
Steff?

Steff Chávez
Yeah, I completely agree. You know, he seemed fiery and a little fierce at times. And he, you know, fought back against those hecklers. He was pretty energetic. But yes, I agree with that completely. He has to sustain it. I think he showed us that he can change the tone. I think there is potential in that, but he has to keep it up. It’s about sustaining it.

Marc Filippino
All right guys, we’re gonna take a quick break. And then when we come back, we’re gonna do Exit Poll. This one’s gonna sting a little.

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Marc Filippino
We’re back with Exit Poll, where we talk about something that did not happen on the campaign trail, and we apply just the most rigorous political analysis to it.

Today we’re talking vaccines, 217 vaccines to be exact. Some people may have heard that a 62-year-old man in Germany decided to get 217 doses of the Covid vaccine in a span of 29 months, which, if you’re keeping score at home, is a jab every four days, just about. The most amazing part is that he didn’t experience any negative health effects. Now, Trump was quite proud of his role in promoting vaccine development back when he was president. So I’m wondering, guys, does this person’s 217-vaccine stunt, could it be good for the former president?

Edward Luce
(Chuckle) I’m just thinking in my end, and the fallout from having, well, was it four? Each time I felt like I had Covid. So, I mean, how you can take it 217 times and have no side effects is . . . 

Marc Filippino
I mean, the dude’s arm must have been absolutely falling off after this, right?

Edward Luce
Completely. Trump should have owned and boasted and never let people forget that the warp-speed process he launched to get the vaccine online quickly happened under his administration and was his greatest single accomplishment. But he can’t because MAGA is anti-vax, so he’s kind of, he’s prisoner of his own success here.

Marc Filippino
Steff, what do you think?

Steff Chávez
No, I agree completely. I think it’s also interesting because it feels at this point that Covid is just not as much in the conversation anymore, and like vaccine uptake has fallen so much, it seems like all the conversations now about Covid are kind of about the economic fallout, and not so much the medical follow-ups that, you know, we need to keep doing. But yeah, I agree, he never talks about that. He never talks about that. And he should.

Marc Filippino
Well, whether it’s good for Trump or bad for Trump, it is a lot of band-aids either way.

I want to thank our guest, Ed Luce. He’s the FT’s US national editor and columnist. He also co-authors our Swamp Notes newsletter. Thanks, Ed.

Edward Luce
Great to be on, Marc.

Marc Filippino
And I also want to thank Steff Chávez. She’s our Washington reporter and author of our US Election Countdown newsletter. Thanks, Steff.

Steff Chávez
Thank you Marc. What a great way to kick off my stint in DC.

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Marc Filippino
This was the Swamp Notes podcast, the US politics show from the FT News Briefing. You want to sign up for the Swamp Notes newsletter? We’ve got a link to that in the show notes. There, we also have a link to Steff’s US Election Countdown newsletter.

Our show is mixed and produced by Ethan Plotkin. It’s also produced by Lauren Fedor and Sonja Hutson. Special thanks to Peter Nicholson. I’m your host, Marc Filippino. Our executive producer is Topher Forhecz, and Cheryl Brumley is the FT’s global head of audio. Check back next week for more US political analysis from the Financial Times.

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