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The State of Things

President Donald Trump speaks during an event in the East Room of the White House.

Evan Vucci/AP

By Evan McMorris-Santoro, Jasmine Wright and Emily Kennard

February 24, 2026 06:01 AM

Today’s notice: A guide to tonight’s speechifying. The SAVE Act dreamers. Get up to speed on MAGA vs. Cardi B. Plus: A former ICE lawyer says the agency’s training program needs urgent reform.

THE LATEST

The State of the Union is… an important opportunity for Donald Trump, and his opposition. Are they ready for it?

Serious headwinds is how Jasmine and NOTUS’ Violet Jira describe the situation for the White House in their preview of tonight’s speech. Polls are not good, and the stock market is not having a great week. Trump needs to get his February 2025 swagger back, his allies say.

“Congress will be there,” a source familiar with the speech told NOTUS, “but the audience is the American people.”

  • Foreign policy. “America First” has turned out to mean a kind of militarized pressure campaign on other nations not seen since George W. Bush. With a new conflict against Iran seemingly possible at any moment, the president needs to convince the public he can Nation Build without the Bush-era baggage.
  • Immigration. The ongoing partial shutdown shows how united Democrats are on the very issue Trump had successfully panicked his political opponents with just last year. Independent voters especially have moved away from Trump on this — can he reset?
  • Economy. “I won affordability,” Trump told a crowd on the campaign trail last week. Even if he’s right, polls show voters really do not believe it. Some of Trump’s allies on the Hill think a good SOTU could change that story.

As for the Democrats, they are feeling a lot stronger than they did a year ago, but the identity crisis is still there. The traditional rebuttal address will be given by Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, but there is no unified Democratic response to tonight.

  • Boycotters are growing in ranks. Democratic leadership is not among them, for the most part. They’re not all doing the same thing instead of going to the speech, and they all have different messages they’re trying to send by not going.
  • Attenders are also trying to send a message. Some, just by being there. “The guy he wanted to hang … is going to be sitting there right in front of him,” Sen. Mark Kelly, one of the Democratic veterans U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro tried and failed to indict, told reporters yesterday.
  • Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is one of several from his party inviting survivors of Jeffrey Epstein to attend. Other Democratic guests include the family of an assassinated Democratic lawmaker from Minnesota, people swept up in Trump’s immigration dragnet and constituents directly affected by the ACA subsidy expiration.

Does this break through? “I have to confess that I think I’m in the camp most voters are in — couldn’t care less about extracurricular SOTU programming and not paying much attention,” Democratic strategist Evan Roth Smith told Emily. “I can’t imagine anything that happens on Tuesday will matter in November.”

Open Tabs FedEx sues for refund of Trump’s emergency tariffs (Reuters); Trump’s top general foresees acute risks in an attack on Iran (WaPo); Trump to visit Texas as Senate primary looms (MS NOW); Binance Fired Staff Who Flagged $1 Billion Moving to Sanctioned Iran Entities (WSJ)

From the Hill

How to save the SAVE Act. The bill is a no-go for Democrats in the Senate, but House Freedom Caucus members are leaning hard on Senate Republicans to make it happen with changes to the filibuster.

That’s a hopeless ask, NOTUS’ Helen Huiskes reports. “It’s a big change from the way we’ve done things, and around here, change doesn’t come very easily,” Sen. John Cornyn said. A reminder that senators — except for a few iconoclasts — love the filibuster. A former senior Senate aide told Helen the ideas from SAVE Act supporters are “magical thinking.”

From the internet

Alex B vs. Cardi B. Trump adviser Alex Bruesewitz spent much of the workday yesterday defending new MAGA cheerleader Nicki Minaj from Politico’s reporting that networks of bots were amplifying her posts.

Bruesewitz told Emily he defended the rapper because he’s a fan and friend of Nicki’s (Minaj even attended his wedding). He posted that the article should have mentioned that “the company that conducted this report, Cyabra, is partnered with Cardi B’s agent,” given the two rappers’ reported years-long beef. (Cardi B’s agent denied any involvement in the story.)

Cardi B shot back, threatening to sue Bruesewitz. That incited an hours-long back-and-forth spanning 9 a.m. to after 4 p.m. Their exchanges received millions of views.

“America got so many issues,” Cardi wrote. “Yet Trump’s advisor is arguing on Twitter with a female rappers. Ladies and gentlemen this is America.”

He invited the rapper to watch the SOTU “to hear about all the amazing things President Trump accomplished last year.”

NEW ON NOTUS

ICE whistleblower. “Without reform, ICE will graduate thousands of new officers who do not know their constitutional duty,” former ICE counsel Ryan Schwank told Democrats at a forum on Capitol Hill yesterday, NOTUS’ Jackie Llanos reports. He told a tale of dangerously inept training inside the agency, and he had documents.

“Despite false claims from the media and sanctuary politicians, no training hours have been cut,” a DHS spox insisted.

NOT US

BE SOCIAL

Another reminder that politics aren’t changing back after Trump leaves office.

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