The State of the Union will have a few empty seats Tuesday night.
Some of the House's highest profile representatives won't be listening to President Trump's annual address on Tuesday in the wake of his impeachment and ongoing Senate trial. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), and Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) all announced Tuesday they wouldn't be showing up.
"After much deliberation," Ocasio-Cortez tweeted she would be skipping the State of the Union because she didn't want to "normalize Trump's lawless conduct and subversion of the Constitution." Pressley borrowed a common Republican adjective to say she wouldn't be attending the "sham SOTU." And Waters, one of the House committee leaders who led the investigation into Trump, gave a similarly strong statement.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), another member of the progressive "Squad" of freshman representatives, tweeted to confirm she would be showing up. "My presence tonight is resistance," she clarified. Omar, Ocasio-Cortez, and the dozens of other women Democrats of the House all attended the State of the Union last year dressed in a striking suffragette white.
A few other congressmembers, including Reps. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) and Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.), have stayed home from every State of the Union address Trump has given in his presidency. And if they have their way, this will be the last time they have to skip out.
-
Has Zohran Mamdani shown the Democrats how to win again?Today’s Big Question New York City mayoral election touted as victory for left-wing populists but moderate centrist wins elsewhere present more complex path for Democratic Party
-
Senate votes to kill Trump’s Brazil tariffSpeed Read Five Senate Republicans joined the Democrats in rebuking Trump’s import tax
-
Border Patrol gets scrutiny in court, gains power in ICESpeed Read Half of the new ICE directors are reportedly from DHS’s more aggressive Customs and Border Protection branch
-
Shutdown stalemate nears key pain pointsSpeed Read A federal employee union called for the Democrats to to stand down four weeks into the government standoff
-
Trump vows new tariffs on Canada over Reagan adspeed read The ad that offended the president has Ronald Reagan explaining why import taxes hurt the economy
-
NY attorney general asks public for ICE raid footageSpeed Read Rep. Dan Goldman claims ICE wrongly detained four US citizens in the Canal Street raid and held them for a whole day without charges
-
Trump’s huge ballroom to replace razed East WingSpeed Read The White House’s east wing is being torn down amid ballroom construction
-
Trump expands boat strikes to Pacific, killing 5 moreSpeed Read The US military destroyed two more alleged drug smuggling boats in international waters
