Stacey Abrams joined President Trump in calling for more bipartisanship to address the nation’s biggest challenges in the Democratic response to the State of the Union address Tuesday night, but she also blamed the White House and Republicans for crushing the hopes of the middle class and failing to stand up for the nation’s “shared values.”
Ms. Abrams, who lost the race to be Georgia’s governor in November, described the GOP as out of touch with the challenges that Americans face on a day-to-day basis — from paying medical bills to seeking out a good education and exercising the right to vote.
“In Georgia and around the country, people are striving for a middle class where a salary truly equals economic security,” Ms. Abrams said. “But instead, families’ hopes are being crushed by Republican leadership that ignores real life or just doesn’t understand it.”
“Under the current administration, far too many hard-working Americans are falling behind, living paycheck to paycheck, most without labor unions to protect them from even worse harm,” she said.
Speaking from her hometown of Atlanta, Ms. Abrams touched on many of the same issues — in particular, voting rights — that she ran on in her quest to become the nation’s first black female governor, which, although unsuccessful, elevated her political profile and left liberal activists clamoring for more.
“Let’s be clear: Voter suppression is real,” she said. “From making it harder to register and stay on the rolls to moving and closing polling places to rejecting lawful ballots, we can no longer ignore these threats to democracy.”
She demanded more action to combat climate change, expand educational opportunity and address “gun safety.” And she said lawmakers could pass a bipartisan “21st-century immigration plan” if it were not for the White House.
“But this administration chooses to cage children and tear families apart,” she said. “Compassionate treatment at the border is not the same as open borders. President Reagan understood this. President Obama understood this. Americans understand this. And Democrats stand ready to effectively secure our ports and borders.”
Despite being “very disappointed” in Mr. Trump’s actions, Ms. Abrams said she doesn’t want him to fail.
“But we need him to tell the truth, and to respect his duties and the extraordinary diversity that defines America,” she said.
Ms. Abrams’ strong showing in Georgia’s gubernatorial race provided Democrats with more reason to believe that demographic changes in Georgia — for years considered safe GOP territory — is becoming more purple and under the right circumstance could be in play in the 2020 election.
It also provided liberal activists with more reason to believe that Ms. Abrams symbolizes the future of the Democratic Party.
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra delivered the Spanish-language response to Mr. Trump, warning that he is prepared to launch a legal challenge against the administration’s push to build a border wall if it tries to circumvent Congress by declaring a state of emergency.
“The idea of declaring a nonexistent state of emergency on the border, in order to justify robbing funds that belong to the victims of fires, floods, hurricanes, and droughts, to pay for the wall is not only immoral, it is illegal,” Mr. Becerra said. “We are ready to reject this foolish proposal in court the moment it touches the ground.”
Democratic leaders, meanwhile, panned Mr. Trump’s speech before he delivered a word of it.
Speaking on the floor of the Senate Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said voters would see through Mr. Trump’s calls for unity and his claims that the nation has become stronger on his watch.
“The state of the Trump economy? Failing America’s middle class,” the New York Democrat said. “The state of Trump health care? Failing American families. The state of the Trump administration? Chaos. The state of Trump foreign policy? Woefully backward, inside out.”
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland blasted out an email saying Mr. Trump has “failed the middle class and made America less secure.”
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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