Brace yourself: Raucous State of the Union launches a brutal Biden-Trump campaign

Bring it on.

President Joe Biden delivered a combative State of the Union address Thursday, targeting Donald Trump by everything except his name and launching a general election already guaranteed to be brutal.

In the president's annual report to Congress, called for in the Constitution, a defiant Biden declared that Americans now face a choice between democracy and despotism. In social media posts critiquing the speech, Trump warned that Biden was driving the nation into economic and national security decline.

"Not since President Lincoln and the Civil War have freedom and democracy been under assault here at home as they are today," Biden declared in the speech's opening passages. He likened the moment to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's address in 1941, when the nation stood on the verge of entering a world war.

The House chamber crackled from the start.

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Hecklers and jibes

Members of Congress on the Democratic side of the aisle repeatedly rose in applause, while those on the Republican side generally sat silent. There was heckling from GOP ranks, and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., pulled on a red MAGA cap (a violation of House rules, by the way) as Biden entered the chamber.

Amid questions about his age and acuity, Biden spoke rapidly, loudly and with confidence. He stumbled over an occasional word but also bantered to GOP jeers, sometimes with a humorous aside.

"Lies!" someone heckled when he decried the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol.

At another point, Democrats chanted "Four more years!"

"Whether the Fake News Media likes admitting it or not, there was tremendous misrepresentation and lies in that Speech," Trump said in a post on Truth Social when the address was over, "but the People of our Country get it, and they know that November 5th will be the Most Important Day in our Nation's History!"

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A tough and angry campaign ahead

Politics has long been a contact sport, of course, and the traditional formality of the State of the Union has at times been disrupted by jeers and heckles since Barack Obama was president.

But this election is poised to be tougher and angrier than any in modern times. It is the first presidential contest since rioters tried to upend the election returns in 2020, when Biden defeated Trump the first time around, and comes at a time the nation's partisan divide has deepened.

Both sides argue that the future of the country, even the nature of its government, is at stake.

In the most starkly political State of the Union address in memory, Biden drew sharp differences with Trump and the Republican Party on abortion rights and gun laws and support for the NATO alliance. He proposed raising taxes on billionaires and corporations. He vowed to bring home the Israelis being held hostage by Hamas and to expand humanitarian aid to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

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At some State of the Union addresses, the president's point is to build bipartisan support to pass ambitious initiatives. That seems an unlikely goal this year.

Instead, Biden's point was to spotlight the differences between the two sides and warn of what he sees as the dangers of electing the other guy.

The policy debates have sharpened. Earlier in the day, the personal attacks also worsened.

A super PAC supporting Trump began airing a TV ad that showed Biden tripping on airplane stairs while, on a split screen, Vice President Kamala Harris was shown laughing uproariously. The narrator questioned whether Biden would live long enough to serve through a new four-year term: "Can he even survive to 2029?"

The ad instantly made the list of the most controversial commercials ever aired for a major presidential candidate, perhaps landing at the top. It was presumably timed to get under Biden's skin hours before his big speech.

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In the official Republican response after the speech, Sen. Katie Britt, R-Arizona, referred to Biden as "dithering and diminished."

Biden didn't seem unnerved. He engaged more forcefully and directly than he has before, castigating the man he identified 13 times as "my predecessor."

When he criticized "my predecessor" and other Republicans for blocking a bipartisan Senate bill that included tougher immigration provisions, some Republicans loudly protested.

"You say no, look at the facts," Biden said, adding mockingly, "I know you know how to read."

His turn in tone may reflect not only the political temperature but also the political calendar.

This was the latest date ever for a State of the Union address, typically delivered in January or February. March 7 turned out to be a propitious political moment, two days after the Super Tuesday contests that made it clear that Biden and Trump have the presidential nominations in hand.

Deliberately or not, that made the address the effective kickoff of the general election, one that will feature the first rematch for the presidency in nearly 70 years. The last time, in 1956, Republican president Dwight Eisenhower defeated Democrat Adlai Stevenson for the second time in a contest that, at least in retrospect, seems gentlemanly.

Legacy of Biden's first term depends on a second

In a world fragmented by social media, with many news outlets sorted into ideological silos, the State of the Union stands as one of the few true bully pulpits left − a single, standing event that commands a huge audience while it happens.

Journalists can be guilty of political hyperbole, too quick to describe speeches as high-stakes, developments as defining and moments as pivotal.

For Biden this time, though, it's hard to deny that those assessments apply.

The legacy of his first term depends in large part on his ability to win a second. There will be a huge historical difference between being the president who twice defeated Donald Trump and being the president who was sandwiched between Trump's two terms.

"I know it might not look like it, but I've been around for a while," Biden said to good-natured laughter as he wound up his speech, then offered a final rebuke to the foe he will face in November.

"My lifetime has taught me to embrace freedom and democracy, a future based on the core values that have defined America," he said. "Now some other people my age see a different story, an American story of resentment, revenge and retribution. That's not me."

There was no doubt just whom he meant as "some other people my age."