Live updates: Trump to deliver 2026 State of the Union address

Trump speculated that Secretary of State Marco Rubio will “go down as the best-ever” in a gushing commendation at the State of the Union.

Reminding attendees that Rubio was confirmed with a 99-0 vote from the Senate, the president also heaped praises on his diplomatic surrogates, special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.

Trump reflected on the long string of wars and potential conflicts between foreign nations that his administration has taken credit for quashing, including: India and Pakistan; the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda; Cambodia and Thailand; and Serbia and Kosovo.

Earlier in the speech, while ruminating on the Supreme Court’s ruling on his tariffs, Trump said he would not have been able to broker peace in foreign conflicts without the threat of tariffs.

Trump directed a West Virginia National Guard general to award Purple Hearts to the family of Sarah Beckstrom and Andrew Wolfe.

Beckstrom died from the National Guard shooting in Washington, D.C., the day before Thanksgiving, while Wolfe survived. The shooting was committed by an Afghan national.

Trump dedicated a portion of his State of the Union in honor of the two National Guard members.

“The two of them, Sarah and Andrew, both shot violently in the head. Neither was expected to make it. They weren’t even given a chance,” he said, adding that Wolfe’s mother was “positive” her son would “make it.”

“Andrew has battled back from the edge of death, and we’re talking about the edge of death on his way to a miraculous recovery,” the president added. “He’s got a little work to do, but he’s doing great. Nice to see he’s a good looking guy. Nice to see you.”

Wolfe received a standing ovation as the general pinned the Purple Heart to his suit jacket.

President Donald Trump called on Congress to swiftly pass Dalilah’s Law, a bill that would prohibit any state from issuing commercial driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants.

“Many, if not most illegal aliens, do not speak English and cannot read even the most basic road signs as to direction, speed, danger, or location,” Trump said during his State of the Union address at the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday evening, motioning to Dalilah and her father, Marcus Coleman, in the room.

“That’s why tonight, I’m calling on Congress to pass what we will call the Dalilah Law, barring any state from granting commercial driver’s licenses to illegal aliens,” Trump said.

Dalilah Coleman was severely injured at the age of five when an illegal immigrant operating an 18-wheeler crashed into her car. The driver illegally entered the country during the Biden administration and had been given a license to drive a commercial vehicle by the state of California.

Coleman’s case is one of many highlighted by the Trump administration over the past year as negative consequences of the millions of illegal immigrants who the Biden administration allowed into the country.

When Trump asked members to stand up if they agreed that the “duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens,” all Democrats stayed seated. Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Ilhan Omar (D-MN) shouted that he was killing American citizens.

“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Trump said to the Democrats sitting down.

“You killed Alex,” Tlaib yelled.

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) went on social media to criticize Trump during his State of the Union.

“Donald Trump is destroying our country,” Newsom posted on X without specifying how.

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In a previous post minutes earlier, the California governor wrote, “The fraud America should be talking about is the billions of dollars Donald Trump has enriched himself with while in office.”

During his joint address to Congress, Trump has been touching on illegal immigration, the economy, and numerous other topics as he attacks Democrats.

President Donald Trump called for the nation to “totally reject” all kinds of political violence during a statement honoring the late Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk.

“In Charlie’s memory, we must all come together to reaffirm that America is one nation under God, and we must totally reject political violence of any kind,” Trump said.

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Trump asked Kirk’s widow, current head of TPUSA, Erika Kirk, to stand before the chamber as he honored her late husband. She stood in tears in honor of her husband.

The chamber stood and applauded in response to his call to reject political violence.

Trump floated a new retirement savings plan for workers during his State of the Union address.

During his speech, Trump said despite the typical 401(k) account rising under his administration, millions of working people still don’t have access to a retirement plan that includes matching employer contributions.

“To remedy this gross disparity, I am announcing that next year my administration will give these oft-forgotten American workers, great people, the people that built our country, access to the same type of retirement plan offered to every federal worker, we will match your contribution with up to $1,000 each year,” Trump said.

Details of the plan aren’t clear, though one option could be repurposing the Obama-era MyRA program, which Trump ended during his first term.

President Donald Trump told Democrats they should “be ashamed” of themselves for not standing in support of a statement prioritizing U.S. citizens over illegal immigrants.

“If you agree with this statement, then stand up and show your support: The first duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens,” Trump said.

As the Democratic side of the House chamber stayed seated, Republicans stood in applause. Trump blasted the other half of the room.

“You should be ashamed of yourself for not standing up. You should be ashamed of yourself,” Trump said.

Despite the Supreme Court overruling the centerpiece of his sweeping, second-term tariff regime, Trump insisted that not only would he maintain his taxes on imports but that they would “substantially replace the modern-day system of income tax.”

Trump’s tariffs have indeed made a nontrivial dent in the federal budget deficit, with the overruled IEEPA tariffs responsible for a roughly 6% reduction in the deficit in the first third of the fiscal 2026 relative to the year prior. Trump’s overall customs collections of $119 billion in the first four months of this fiscal year would amount to nearly a half-trillion dollars.

But the federal government collected almost $2.7 trillion last year, or over five times as much as Trump’s tariffs would generate even if the high court hadn’t overturned the legal justification for his tariffs.

Furthermore, the deficit is already historically unprecedented for a country with such a robust economy, currently involved in no war. Recall that the federal government spent over $7 trillion. Where would Trump find the next $6.5 trillion on top of his tariffs?

Trump asked Congress to enact his Great Healthcare Plan and to codify his Most Favored Nation drug pricing agreements with pharmaceutical companies.

The Trump administration, in recent months, has made at least 16 MFN agreements with pharmaceutical companies, under which they commit, under threat of tariffs, to lower their prices in the United States to match the lowest prices sold in other developed countries. 

Negotiated drug prices are available to consumers purchasing prescriptions without insurance on the direct-to-consumer discount platform TrumpRx.

TRUMP UNVEILS TRUMPRX DRUG DISCOUNT SITE IN EFFORT TO LOWER PRESCRIPTION COSTS

“Americans who have for decades paid by far the highest prices of any nation anywhere in the world for prescription drugs will now pay the lowest price anywhere in the world for drugs anywhere,” Trump said.

Trump asked Johnson and Thune to codify MFN. 

“I’m not sure it matters because it’s going to be very hard for somebody that comes along after me to say, let’s raise drug prices by 700 or 800%, but John and Mike, if you don’t mind, codify it anyway,” Trump said. 

Trump unveiled a “rate payer protection pledge,” an effort to prevent homeowners from bearing the brunt of high electricity costs associated with the deployment of artificial intelligence data centers.

The administration is entering nonbinding agreements with major tech firms, establishing that the companies have an obligation to provide for their own power needs.

“They can build their own power plants as part of their factory so that no one’s prices will go up, and in many cases, prices of electricity will go down for the community,” Trump said. “This is a unique strategy never used in this country before.”

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Energy demand from data centers is expected to surge dramatically over the next decade, with BloombergNEF estimating that data centers will consume more than 100 gigawatts by 2035. By comparison, data center demand in 2024 was estimated to be around 34.7 gigawatts. For comparison, 1 megawatt is traditionally considered to be roughly the same amount of energy consumed by 400 to 900 homes annually.

Trump’s bruised hand, showing discoloration, was photographed while he delivered the State of the Union before Congress.

The White House has said in the past his injury was caused by his many hand-shaking interactions with officials and others.

Although the Supreme Court overturned the centerpiece of Trump’s sweeping, second-term tariff regime, the president insisted that not only would he manage to keep his tariffs in place but also that “congressional action will not be necessary to do so.”

The nation’s highest court ruled that regardless of the national emergency used to justify his tariffs, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act does not ever confer the presidential power to invoke tariffs. Trump has replaced these IEEPA tariffs with the invocation of Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act, which explicitly does permit the president to unilaterally impose tariffs, but only for a maximum of 150 days and only to rectify “large and serious” balance-of-payments deficits.

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Trump’s problems may begin long before that 150-day limit. While Trump may rail against the nation’s balance-of-trade deficit, the United States has a corresponding financial account balance, which in turn means that the U.S. has virtually zero deficit in its balance of payments.

While the Supreme Court majority was splintered across five separate opinions, not one of the justices in the majority argued that Congress gave away its Article I power to tax imports to the president under IEEPA. Perhaps there is a second law Trump can discover that allows him to do that indefinitely, but Section 122 is not it.

President Donald Trump called the Supreme Court’s tariff ruling “very unfortunate” during his State of the Union address as four of the justices sat before him.

Chief Justice John Roberts and justices Amy Coney Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh, and Elena Kagan are all in attendance at the address, Kavanaugh being the only one of the four to vote in favor of the IEEPA tariffs on Friday. Trump said Tuesday that despite the “very unfortunate” ruling, many nations want to retain their current tariff rates.

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“The good news is that almost all countries and corporations want to keep the deal that they already made,” Trump said. “Knowing that the legal power that I, as president, have to make a new deal could be far worse for them, and therefore they will continue to work along the same successful path that we had negotiated before the Supreme Court’s unfortunate involvement.”

Trump directly blamed Democrats for the nation’s affordability crisis, a problem that he has tried to own since the 2025 elections saw Democrats take control of the issue.

Democrats in Congress “suddenly used the word affordability,” Trump said during his State of the Union address. “Somebody gave it to them, knowing full well that they caused and created the increased prices that all of our citizens had to endure. You caused that problem.”

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“They knew their statements were a lie. They knew it. They knew their statements were a dirty, rotten lie,” he said.

The president has been touting his economic policies since taking office last year, and his latest speech was no different.