On February 28, 2017, President Donald Trump addressed a joint session of Congress (also his cabinet, the Supreme Court, and other audience members) for the first time as President of the United States. President Trump started his address by condemning the recent anti-Semitic threats and vandalism. Something that his critics called for, for a while now. Trump spent the rest of his roughly hour-long speech touching upon almost every thinkable topic in his domestic policy. Trump touched on national security, immigration, jobs, health care, taxes, regulations, and a few more. Trump notably did not talk much on his foreign policy, notably not mentioning Russia at all. The President did, however, mention Israel, Mexico, Canada, and his desire to eliminate ISIS. President Trump also talked about each of the guests that he and the First Lady had brought with them. Trump had widows of people killed by undocumented immigrants, a woman with a rare disease, and the widow of Navy SEAL chief Ryan Owens. Owens was killed in a raid that President Trump ordered in Yemen a few weeks ago. Trump has taken a lot of criticism for what some consider a “failure”, but Trump re-affirmed that the raid was indeed successful, as it yielded significant intel on various terrorist groups.

So far, the President’s speech has been getting good reviews by various news outlets, conservative and liberal alike. Those liberal-leaning sources said that Trump, for the first time, sounded “presidential”. Various polls have shown that Americans look upon this speech as quite favorable, which is exactly what Trump wanted, due to his previously historically low approval ratings. The Trump administration will surely look to keep this new wave approval alive for as long as possible, as more approval (from the people) is certainly needed by them.