Biden to juggle competing political demands in State of the Union address

In his State of the Union speech this week, President Joe Biden will pose a question that he hopes will answer itself: Whose side are you on?

WASHINGTON — In his State of the Union speech this week, President Joe Biden will pose a question that he hopes will answer itself: Whose side are you on?

Are Americans, as he’ll frame it, on the side of lower health care costs, democratic freedoms and Ukraine’s fight to keep itself from being swallowed up by Russia? Or on the side of drug company profits, tax breaks for the wealthy and Russia’s autocratic leader Vladimir Putin?

Baked into the argument that Biden will lay out Thursday night is that he’s on the right side of all these issues and that voters should unite behind him, as opposed to his likely Republican rival in the presidential election, former President Donald Trump.

The stark choices facing the U.S. will be the propulsive theme of Biden’s third State of the Union speech, advisers say. He’ll use the moment to remind voters about hard-won legislative victories of which they’re mostly unaware, polls show, while pledging to revamp the tax code in a second term so that middle-class Americans get some financial help.

He’ll also look to ease growing unhappiness inside his own party about his handling of the war between Israel and Hamas. Biden’s failure to forge an enduring cease-fire has splintered his party and spawned a grassroots movement to deprive him of delegates at the Democratic presidential nominating convention in Chicago.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/biden-state-of-the-union-rcna140766

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