Reaction To Trump's State Of The Union Address Follows A Predictable Script

Reaction to President Trump's first State of the Union speech followed the familiar choose-your-own-partisan-narrative script that's dominated political life since the 2016 election.

Republican members of Congress frequently offered safe, predictable praise particularly around economic policy. Said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.: "We're coming out of this economic funk that we were in throughout the Obama years and the president was right to talk about it and to take some credit for the direction America is heading in."

Predictably, Democrats were less impressed. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., tweeted that the 80-minute speech, which decried illegal immigration and called for more reverence of the flag and the national anthem, "stoked the fires of division instead of bringing us closer together."

Although the first half of Trump's speech included multiple calls for bipartisanship, even Democrats who represent states that Trump won were skeptical of the president's words. "We need a president who will not only call for more bipartisanship, but shows he's willing to work in a bipartisan way," tweeted Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla.

While the political climate appears challenging for many Republicans in this year's upcoming midterms, none of the party's most vulnerable candidates sought to put any distance between themselves and the president after the speech.

"I look forward to continue working with this administration to fix our failing roads and bridges, rebuild our military, address our broken immigration system, and help Nevadans get ahead," said Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., the only Republican senator up for re-election in a state won by Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Beyond the Capitol, conservative writer Jonah Goldberg at the National Review said, "except for some laudable bits about streamlining the bureaucracy and improving FDA policy, there wasn't a hint of fiscal conservatism to it." Goldberg noted that Trump mentioned neither the budget deficit nor the national debt.

From the other end of the ideological spectrum, Trump's description of a strengthening economy rang false to liberal writer Jonathan Chait of New York Magazine:

After depicting the American economy as a bleak wasteland before his election, Trump has rebranded it as unimaginable prosperity, fueled by the hope inspired by his brilliant reforms. In fact, nothing has yet changed.

One response that will likely come unscripted? The president's response to the coverage of his own speech. Whatever narrative he may have set Tuesday evening, it's possible Trump will have an entirely different message when he returns to his favorite medium, Twitter, perhaps as early as Wednesday morning.

Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.