Over one hour and 48 minutes, the president argued that Americans shouldn’t trust their own eyes.
Instead, they should just believe him.
Doubtless, this approach worked with his dwindling base, but it’s hard to believe that it was effective with anyone else.
For one thing, Trump really didn’t make a case for his presidency or his policies. He contended that he inherited a mess and tried to pin the blame for any economic dissatisfaction on former President Joe Biden and Biden’s fellow Democrats.
The problem with that approach is that it has no basis in reality.
While the stock market continues to soar, much of its lift has been generated by the elimination of jobs due to advances in artificial intelligence.
That’s troubling, but even more troubling are other economic indicators.
While Biden struggled during his presidency to control inflation, he did create jobs—roughly 16 million of them over his four years in the White House. On Trump’s watch, on the other hand, the American economy created only 181,000 jobs in 2025—roughly 5% of the average yearly job growth during Biden’s presidency.
Sensing perhaps that his crowing about his economic successes wouldn’t be persuasive, Trump pivoted quickly to attacking his political opponents. He lambasted congressional Democrats repeatedly, baiting them to stand up and support measures he knew they would be philosophically and ideologically opposed to.
His strategy was clear.
He wanted to mobilize his base—the hard core of Make America Great Again supporters who stick with him through all trials and believe everything he says, no questions asked.
It’s a curious strategy, because Trump’s base, all by itself, isn’t enough to win an election even when he is on the ballot. When he’s not on the ballot—as he won’t be in this autumn’s midterm elections—they don’t turn out in force.
But his anti-Democratic rhetoric, on the other hand, does arouse and energize his opposition. If Trump is good at mobilizing MAGA supporters, he’s superb at doing so with progressives who otherwise might devote their energies to complaining about establishment Democratic leaders.
He unifies Democrats more than any Democratic heavyweight—including former President Barack Obama—could do.
That is and always has been Trump’s challenge.
The more he talks in ways that inspire his own supporters, the more he spurs his opponents to band together.
Perhaps that is why he devoted so much of his speech to feel-good moments. He handed out awards and medals as if he were a barker at a county fair, bestowing the honors almost indiscriminately on both Olympic athletes and genuine war heroes.
It was as if he were trying to cloak himself in the borrowed glory of gold-medal winners and veterans who showed true valor. Somehow, he seemed to think celebrating them would translate or transfer into celebrating him.
It isn’t likely to work, in large part because the presumption at its heart was that the majority of Americans are stupid.
For example, Trump once again trotted out the canard that other nations paid for the tariffs he loves so much. In fact, tariffs are taxes on American consumers who buy foreign goods.
He bragged about bringing in billions of dollars with those tariffs—without bothering to mention that all that money came in from hardworking Americans who are finding it more and more difficult to find jobs or make ends meet.
That’s why this State of the Union probably will come to be remembered as a missed opportunity.
Donald Trump had the opportunity to tell the Americans who have grave doubts about his leadership and his priorities that he heard them and that their concerns are his.
Instead, he chose to tell them that it was all in their heads and that they should just take him at his word.
It wasn’t a message grounded in reality.
And it was delivered by a president who seems to have bought into his own con.
