Sen. Joni Ernst delivered a simple, competent response to President Obama’s State of the Union address Tuesday night. Outside of a story about wearing bread bags on her shoes as a child, she really didn’t take any risks in her speech.
And that’s probably a good thing.
While past GOP politicians who have responded to SOTU speeches have gone on to become presidential hopefuls, they haven’t had much success. Call it the responder’s curse.
Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., is still in a leadership position within the party, but isn’t a rock star; former Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels passed on a 2012 presidential run and faded to obscurity. While those two didn’t do any harm to their reputation, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal’s poor speech and awkwardness hurt his chances for promotion. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s water bottle moment somehow overshadowed his entire speech.
And of course former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, who gave the response in 2010, is headed to prison next month.
With Ernst telling a simple folksy tale about her childhood and staying clear of any specifics in her speech, she may not appear particularly inspiring. But given the Left’s treatment of her during her campaign, that’s probably the best she could hope for on Tuesday.
Ernst spoke of cutting spending, balancing the budget, lowering taxes and providing good jobs. She spent a good chunk of time speaking about America’s military and veterans (she is a lieutenant colonel in the Iowa Army National Guard).
On al Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, Ernst did ding the Obama administration by claiming “threats like these can’t just be wished away.”
She brought up the problems at the Veteran’s Affairs department by saying America’s veterans “deserve nothing less than the benefits they were promised and a quality of care we can be all be proud of,” a welcome statement to those who feel the Obama administration has forgotten about the problems at the agency. Obama said nothing specific about them in his speech, although he did mention delays to veterans’ benefits.
Other than that, Ernst rattled off a list of GOP goals: correcting executive overreach, cybersecurity, confronting Iran over its “nuclear ambitions” and pushing anti-abortion bills. Nothing new or bold. With a few exceptions, most of Ernst’s proposals overlapped in some form with what Obama discussed in his SOTU address.
But given the past history of SOTU responders and Ernst’s already rising star, her speech will probably help her in the future in a way past speeches have failed.
