My last State of the Union

And we won the primary

As you may have seen, last night was the State of the Union. 

My wife, Marisa, sat in the balcony. I was on the House floor with the entire House, the Senate, the Supreme Court, the Cabinet, and the Joints Chiefs.

This was my second SOTU, and honestly one of the best parts is milling around before it starts.

The Senators came in pretty early, so it gave us a chance to say hello. I really don’t see Senators too often. They work on the other side of the Capitol and we don’t normally cross paths. So over the last few weeks I had been making a mental note of the Senators I wanted to speak briefly with, knowing this would be a decent chance to do it.

By the time the Cabinet and the Supreme Court walks in, the ceremony is really underway and there’s not really a chance to say hello. I’m not sure I would try to have a word with a member of our Supreme Court even if I could - would feel inappropriate to me - but in any event there’s not really a moment for that.

And by the way, all of this takes place under the brightest possible lights. Literally. For nationally televised ceremonies, they turn on the spotlights that hang in each corner of the ceiling. What you’re seeing on TV is about 3x brighter than it normally is on the House floor. There’s a lot of squinting and shielding your eyes when you first step onto the House floor as your eyes adjust.

A few observations from inside the room during the speech:

• There was less heckling than I expected. A group of us made a bet before the speech and we figured there would be four or five clear heckles from members of Congress. I only counted two. (One guy in the balcony went berserk and had to be removed, but we didn’t count that toward the total.)

• When support for Ukraine was mentioned, about 75% of the members stood and clapped. I think that’s roughly indicative of the level of support from Congress.

• There weren’t too many topics that brought everyone to their feet. Two exceptions were the mention that Sweden joined NATO this week and the recognition of the Swedish Prime Minister in the balcony. Another was the mention of the late Rep. John Lewis, with whom most members here served for their entire time in Congress.

• When the President mentioned support for IVF, I looked up at Marisa. She had IVF twice, and now we have Owen (age 8) and Avery (age 5). She was standing and clapping about as hard as you can imagine. I thought it was beautiful and I was really glad she was there for that moment. 

Since I’m leaving Congress at the end of the year, this will be my last State of the Union. I tried to glance around and commit as much of it to my long-term memory as possible. Being able to be part of such a singular moment for our democracy - all three branches, under one roof, while the President stands and addresses them - is an honor so great as to be a little disorienting. It’s part of my past now, but it’s a part I will remember well.

Campaign update - we won

I was tempted to put this up top, but we won our primary for Attorney General.

We had been the favorite to win at the beginning, but three weeks ago - as I told you - the other party decided to start a super PAC and spend $1m on behalf of my opponent. It was an effort to block me from reaching the general.

Now we’re heading into the real fight. And we know we are going to get body-slammed by outside spending in the fall.

Imagine there’s a group with so much money that they’re willing to burn $1m against you in a primary just on the off-chance it might weaken you before you hit the general. That’s who we’re dealing with, and it’s going to take us months to become strong enough to survive the onslaught headed our way.

I’m asking for your support to help us kick off our general election campaign by joining us for our second Zoom event, with proceeds going toward our campaign. 

Last December, our campaign held our first Zoom fundraiser. It was a bit of an experiment to see if people would be interested in that kind of meeting, and about 300 joined us.

When we asked for feedback, lots of people said we should do one Zoom event each quarter so that no matter where people live, they could have a chance to participate in our campaign. That seemed like a good idea.

We’ll focus on what to expect in the general election: the polling, our strategy, our opponent, and the North Carolina political landscape. (And maybe some discussion about what’s going on in Congress, since I’m still there.) 

You can grab a spot here.

Thanks so much, and see you next week.

Best,

Jeff