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The whole nation is prepping for the President’s second State of the Union address of his second term, and while it’s expected to be something of a victory lap for the Republicans, there are still a lot of questions as to how the Democrats might behave.
For starters, recently elected Christian Menefee, who currently represents the TX-18 district, has announced that he will be skipping out one the event entirely, saying in a statement, that he's choosing to stay in Houston rather then listen to "President Trump lie."
Last year, the Democrat caucus made headlines for their antics during the speech, which included everything from matching attire to continued interruptions of the President, which led to Rep. Al Green (D-TX) being removed from the House chamber.
Chris Johnson, a Republican strategist and president of the American Energy Leadership Institute, says you can probably expect to see the same from the Democrats tonight. “It’s going to be all about performative reactions,” he predicted. “The number one thing that animates the Democrat base is Donald Trump and how you are opposing him.”
Johnson says this is an opportunity for President Trump to highlight some of his popular successes, like the closing of the southern border, and force Democrats to oppose it. “If he’s gonna talk about his record on immigration and no-brainer things, and he can rile them up against that, that’s exactly where he wants to be,” he said.
Johnson believes that will add to the radical and out-of-touch look that already plagues the Democrat Party. He also believes that may be why the DNC has chosen recently elected Governor Abigail Spanberger of Virginia to deliver the official Democrat response to Trump’s speech.
According to Johnson: “The main issue that voters have with Democrats is they look at the people that are running the party and go, ‘These people are insane!’ And so if you put somebody out there like Spanberger who at least codes as normal, that’s gonna be a huge help.”