Make American great again —for everyone
For many years, the State of the Union stood as a unifying force, bringing our country together, suspending partisanship, and celebrating our victories, values, and goals for the future.
When our leaders spoke about our nation’s accomplishments, perhaps they inflated some things, but there was usually credence and truth beneath their orations. The President’s State of the Union speech, however, was divisive, at times malicious, and was a masterclass in gaslighting, exclusion, and the “discombobulation” of confusing dominance with progress.
The question of whether America “is back” is actually pretty simple to answer. A country’s greatness is judged by its weakest members, and over the past year, millions of Americans in need of government assistance have been cut off through new legislation (estimated to impact 20 million families over the next ten years), whether through SNAP or Medicaid.
He asserted that he has fixed health care (he actually said that he’s cut drug prices by 100%), but over the past six months, I have been denied medications outright and forced to pay hundreds of dollars for others.
The Big Beautiful Bill, which was not the largest tax cut but the sixth-largest, significantly reduced government spending on safety-net programs, making the weak, weaker.
Meanwhile, he has proposed a $1.5 trillion defense spending budget for 2027, up from $900 billion in 2026, – “They got money for war but not to feed the poor” —Tupac.)
The President has ended DEI efforts, making the country less safe for large portions of the citizenry, he’s terrorized the minority community, and he didn’t say a single word about how he was going to help the disabled or the mentally ill (other than 5-year-old Delilah, who is just starting to learn to walk again, and he asked her to stand up.)
The economy was actually in great shape in 2024 under Biden, adding 1.4 million jobs, compared to 181,000 under Trump in 2025. He touts stock market success, but 87% of all stock value is owned by the 10% wealthiest families, and half of Americans have no stake in the game at all.
He talked about saving money on eggs and beef (we’ll talk about oil in a bit), but those spending reductions are negligible because housing, electricity, and other high-cost commodities are currently skyrocketing. (Electricity up 6.3% in the past 12 months.) He claimed that he secured $18 trillion in commitments from across the globe, but even the most generous estimates, which include mostly inflated, multi-year, aspirational goals tied to a slew of unrealistic requirements, would put the number at about half that.
And as for restoring the manufacturing sector in America through tariffs, the vast majority of managers in that industry have said tariffs have been a drag on business because of international supply chains.
The President really went ham on talking about success in lowering the crime rate, but isn’t it a little weird that he also talked extensively about cities being saturated by violence and crime? If the crime rate was so low, why do we need to institute police states in places like Minnesota? It’s an obvious contradiction in an attempt to capture his audience’s admiration while also fear-mongering them into believing that something needs to be done, particularly about minority and immigrant communities.
What makes even less sense is when you consider that first-generation immigrants are 60% less likely to become criminals than US citizens. (I know, MAGA, hard to believe that being undocumented is only a civil violation.) Not to mention that 74% of immigrants currently being held in detention custody have no criminal record.
Speaking of detention centers, it was a little mortifying that he honored a World War II vet for liberating an internment camp, when he’s literally building internment camps all over the country. Claims that Trump ended eight wars based on momentary cease-fires, which had only limited U.S. involvement, are unfounded. In actuality, there has not been a single war he has ended during this administration.
As for oil, the President does not set gasoline prices; in fact, the dominant force driving GLOBAL market capitulation is the worldwide oversupply of oil. With the U.S. being the largest producer of oil in the world, and the world currently being oversupplied, it really doesn’t make sense to literally steal $700 million in barrels from Venezuela; all it did was add to his reputation as a kleptocrat.
So, is America back? It certainly is for the pedophiles, it certainly is for the billionaires, it certainly is for white nationalists, and the evangelicals who can now buy a Trump bible for $99.
But for the rest of us, well – we kind of wish that we made America great again – for everyone.
Tyler Kania lives in Columbia.