Five Things In Trump’s State Of The Union The Media Mostly Ignored

By Chris Rochester -
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January 31, 2018

By Chris Rochester

President Trump’s first State of the Union address on Tuesday was full of good, conservative policy – including both victories from his first year in office and plans for the next. But don’t rely on mainstream coverage of the speech to point that out.

Instead, the narrative-crazed mainstream media is focused on the so-called elephant in the room – the looming Mueller investigation, Trump’s possible sit-down with the special prosecutor, and everything else that’s completely irrelevant to old fashioned kitchen table economics. Why let boring policy that affects the daily lives of the American people get in the way of a good storyline?

Here are five things Trump talked about Tuesday night that haven’t been getting the attention they deserve.

5. Judges

The Senate on Tuesday confirmed Trump’s nomination of Minnesota Supreme Court Justice David Stras to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the 13th Circuit Court appointment by Trump to clear the Senate.

Trump talked about his commitment to appointing judges and justices in the mold of the late Antonin Scalia, pointing to Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch as the embodiment of his approach to putting people on the federal bench.

4. Infrastructure

The president used his pitch for a federal infrastructure initiative to issue a call for bipartisan cooperation to fund a campaign to create the “safe, fast, reliable, and modern infrastructure our economy needs and our people deserve.”

Some conservatives will balk at the cost to federal, state and local taxpayers, while liberals will probably complain Trump isn’t proposing to spend enough (they’ll likely claim whatever dollar figure he proposes isn’t enough). Importantly, though, Trump accompanied his call for an infrastructure package with reforms to the red tape and paperwork that slows all manner of projects to a crawl.

Trump cited the Empire State Building, which took just over a year to build at the height of the Great Depression. Cutting federal red tape will go a long way to ensuring infrastructure dollars are spent efficiently, whatever the total bill.

3. De-regulation

Red tape in infrastructure projects is a problem ripe for problem-solvers, but Trump’s administration has been hard at work slashing regulations all year.

Amid his call for cabinet secretaries to have the power to reward good federal workers and fire bad ones who violate the public trust – like thousands his administration has let go from the VA – Trump pointed out his administration’s extraordinary success in slashing burdensome federal rules.

“In our drive to make Washington accountable, we have eliminated more regulations in our first year than any administration in history,” Trump said. That’s true: Trump’s administration has far surpassed his campaign pledge by eliminating 22 regulations for every new one put into place. Trump has also cancelled 1,500 pending Obama-era regulations, preventing them from ever taking effect.

2. Good economic news

Wisconsin conservatives can be forgiven if they’re suffering a little déjà vu at the suggestion the media is sweeping good economic news under the rug. Nationally, the unemployment rate is 4.1 percent, a 17-year low. In his speech the president also cited unemployment claims, which are at a 45-year low. Black and Hispanic unemployment are at or near record lows.

Jobs – particularly manufacturing jobs – are coming back ashore, Trump said. “Since the election, we have created 2.4 million new jobs, including 200,000 new jobs in manufacturing alone.”

Trump also said that the cheapest kind of economic stimulus – small business confidence – is at an all-time high, too, and, “The stock market has smashed one record after another, gaining $8 trillion in value.” Just one year in, and conservative policies are already having a life-changing impact on the economy and the lives of Americans across the nation.

1. Tax cuts

To brush aside the biggest conservative victory so far in Trump’s young presidency would be unfathomable. Trump pointed out the benefits of the tax cuts to middle-class Americans, who will not only pay less in federal income taxes starting in February but who are benefitting already from bonuses, raises, better benefits, and increased retirement contributions.

Three million Americans have already gotten a raise, a bonus, or some other benefit thanks to federal tax reform – and it’s still only been a few weeks since the law’s enactment.

Importantly – and something that’s been almost completely ignored by the media – is that the tax bill cored out Obamacare by eliminating the individual mandate, which Trump called “an especially cruel tax that fell mostly on Americans making less than $50,000 a year, forcing them to pay tremendous penalties simply because they could not afford government-ordered health plans.”

President Trump has proven that implementing conservative policy is good for the nation. According to the Heritage Foundation, Trump has taken action on 64 percent of their conservative policy recommendations. The policies have already paid dividends – though you likely won’t find a robust discussion of it on your nightly news.