Trump set to address the nation as dozens of Democrats say they’ll boycott

WASHINGTON- As President Trump prepares to deliver his annual State of the Union address Tuesday evening, the event will take place against the backdrop of a widening Democratic protest and growing resistance from lawmakers who balk at the president’s remarks.

More than 30 congressional Democrats have pledged to boycott the speech altogether, while others plan to attend alternative events designed to compete with the president’s message.

“I think we’re going to hear from two different States of the Union: One from the president who will be full of lies and then you’ll hear the truth,” California Sen. Alex Padilla, who will deliver the Democrats’ response in Spanish, said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon.

Democrats considering skipping the president’s formal address to Congress said they were doing so because they didn’t want to give credit to Trump. Others plan to express their opposition to Trump by inviting guests concerned with his agenda.

California Democratic Reps. Robert Garcia and Ro Khanna will attend alongside Annie Farmer and Haley Robson, two of the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender whose trafficking crimes have dogged Trump since he returned to office a year ago.

“I invited Annie to the State of the Union so she could join other survivors and remind the president of his refusal to release all of the Epstein files,” Garcia wrote in an article on X on Monday.

The Democratic opposition underscores the tense political moment Trump faces at the start of his second term, when the stakes are high for Republicans seeking to maintain control of Congress ahead of the midterm elections.

Trump, who is scheduled to begin speaking at 6 p.m. PT, is expected to frame the moment as one defined by economic successes and campaign promises kept, particularly regarding his administration’s crackdown on immigration.

Trump is also expected to appeal to his religious base. He has invited Erika Kirk, the widow of the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, and intends to use her presence to draw attention to the “tremendous revival of faith” that has taken place since Kirk’s assassination, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on X.

“The president will call on Congress to ‘strongly reject political violence against our citizens’ with Charlie Kirk’s widow in the House,” Leavitt said.

The president’s remarks could also shed light on his thinking on simmering international conflicts in the Middle East and Mexico as Trump pressures his southern neighbor to curb drug trafficking.

Another potential issue that could be addressed in the speech is tariffs, even more so after the Supreme Court ruled Friday that Trump’s favored tariff policy was illegal and could not stand without congressional approval.

Trump has stressed his intention to impose new tariffs in different ways and suggested he should not need congressional approval to do so. If Trump persists in imposing new tariffs, his approach will be at odds with Republican leaders.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters Monday that it would be “a challenge to find consensus on any path forward on tariffs, on the legislative side.”

Trump’s handling of the tariff issue would underscore the existential moment Congress finds itself in as it navigates the Trump administration’s second term.

In recent months, Trump’s push to sideline Congress in major policy decisions — whether on trade or national security — has exposed fractures within his own party and deepened partisan divisions.

That of Tuesday evening could even highlight these tensions.

Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) has criticized Trump’s use of military force without congressional approval since his administration began blowing up suspected drug boats in the Caribbean Sea late last year.

As Trump says he is considering a military attack on Iran, Schiff once again raises concerns that Trump is stoking broader conflicts abroad.

“Our allies don’t trust us. Our adversaries don’t fear us,” Schiff said on the Senate floor Tuesday. “When the next crisis comes – and it will, and it might even be caused by this president – ​​we will find ourselves isolated.”

Trump’s push for greater federal control over elections could also expose some fractures.

In May, at Trump’s request, the Justice Department began demanding voter registration data from states across the country. Democrats see the move as a pretext for false claims of voter fraud, as congressional Republicans raise new barriers to voter registration through the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act.

“The Trump administration has no qualms about threatening to undermine and steal this November election,” Padilla said. “They know their record is not only unpopular, but has been so damaging to working families that their only hope of staying in power is to launch a voter purge. »

Democrats’ concerns were reinforced by comments made last week by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in which she outlined plans to station federal immigration agents at polling places “to make sure the right people vote and elect the right leaders.”