January, 31 2018, 02:30pm EDT
Green Party Rebuttal to President Trump's 2018 State of the Union Address
Green Party leaders responded to President Trump's 2018 State of the Union address on Tuesday, Jan. 30, with sharp criticism of his statements on energy in light of the climate crisis, plans for more nuclear weapons, health care, immigration, and other administration policies.
WASHINGTON
Green Party leaders responded to President Trump's 2018 State of the Union address on Tuesday, Jan. 30, with sharp criticism of his statements on energy in light of the climate crisis, plans for more nuclear weapons, health care, immigration, and other administration policies.
Green rebuttals to Mr. Trump's speech and to reactions from both Democratic and Republican parties can be read below. The rebuttals advocate alternative ideas like the Green New Deal, Single-Payer health care, and global nuclear disarmament.
The Green Party aired a simulcast of the president's speech on GreenStream, the party's livestream channel, with post-speech comments and Q&A by Jill Stein and Ajamu Baraka, the 2016 Green presidential and vice-presidential candidates respectively. Craig Seeman (Green Party of New York) was technical producer for the broadcast. The comments and Q&A can be viewed here.
Video responses by Green Party leaders and candidates to the State of the Union are posted on here. Greens also live-tweeted on the party's Twitter page during the speech.
Green Party rebuttals to President Trump's State of the Union:
Climate Change
ExxonMobil's $50 billion investment in the U.S., praised by Mr. Trump in his speech, comes at a time when drastic measures are needed to reduce consumption of fossil fuels and the power of oil companies.
In November 2017, more than 15,000 scientists from 184 countries warned that humanity is facing "widespread misery and catastrophic biodiversity loss... Soon it will be too late to shift course away from our failing trajectory." The scientists sounded an alarm on greenhouse gas emissions, temperature change, ocean dead zones, and depleted freshwater resources, vertebrate species, and total forest cover.
During the State of the Union, the president boasted of expanded fossil fuel use (especially "clean coal" -- which doesn't exist) and reduced corporate regulation, in line with the reckless and anti-scientific skepticism of the Republican Party despite recent predictions of more extreme effects.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Party acknowledges the threat of climate change but has refused to endorse steps necessary against the crisis. President Obama blocked international agreements to reduce CO2 emissions from being legally binding and the 2016 Democratic platform rejected carbon taxes and excluded limits on drilling and fracking.
Greens have proposed a way to avert a global climate catastrophe, convert to a 100% clean, renewable energy by 2030, ensure financial stability, address human needs, and provide millions of new jobs in clean, renewable energy technology, retrofitting homes and buildings for energy efficiency, expanded mass transportation for a sharp reduction in care traffic, and other measures.
This plan is called the Green New Deal.
Global warming went unmentioned in Mr. Trump's speech and in Rep. Joe Kennedy's response on behalf of Democrats. The Green Party remains the only political party that takes the crisis seriously.
Health care
President Trump promised to reduce the price of prescription drugs, but GOP reforms will only worsen the Affordable Care Act's defects. Both major parties remain loyal to generous for-profit insurance, pharmaceutical, and other health lobbies.
The Green Party calls for Single-Payer national health care (Improved Medicare For All), the only solution that will make medical care universal, drastically reduce costs, and save Americans from financial ruin over a medical emergency. Greens call for health care to be recognized as a human right, not a commodity.
Military spending, nuclear arms, and foreign policy
President Trump's call for more nuclear weaponry is further evidence of his loyalty to Pentagon generals and dedication to military imperialism, the permanent wartime economy, and grossly bloated U.S. military budgets -- nearly $700 billion in the proposed Fiscal 2018 National Defense Authorization Act, which has bipartisan support.
The Green Party calls deep cuts in military funding (except for veterans's services) with redirection of such to money to human needs; global nuclear disarmament; closing of Guantanamo Bay and U.S. bases around the world; diplomacy and adherence to international law to resolve international conflict; a halt to U.S. aid for countries that violate human rights, including Israel for its brutal apartheid system and Saudi Arabia in its continuing assault on Yemen; and an end to Mr. Trump's insults and reckless threats aimed at North Korea, Iran, and other nations.
Greens see a glimmer of hope in current negotiations between North and South Korea undertaken independently of the Trump Administration.
Greens are equally concerned over Democrats' revival of the Cold War, with McCarthyite allegations against those who engage in political dissent (some directed at Jill Stein and the Green Party) and an embrace of neocon foreign policies. This mentality has resulted in tacit approval among many liberals for corporate censorship of ideas on the Internet.
The Green Party calls for a new peace movement that recognizes the belligerence of both the Democratic and Republican parties. See also commentary by Ajamu Baraka, 2016 Green vice-presidential nominee and founder of Black Alliance for Peace.
Immigration
Greens called President Trump's focus on gang violence committed by a small number of immigrants a slanderous and racist attempt to stoke fear and hatred. In reality, undocumented immigrants are statistically more law-abiding than the general U.S. population.
Republican enthusiasm for criminalizing and deporting immigrants -- bolstered by Democratic compromises during the recent government shutdown -- have been used to justify the president's repeal of DACA and barring of refugees seeking asylum, many fleeing countries like Honduras where bipartisan U.S. support for brutally repressive governments led them to seek shelter in the U.S.
The Green Party calls for human rights for immigrants, an end to Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and deportations of immigrants, preservation of DACA, and a welcome to those fleeing violence and poverty.
Post-hurricane aid for Puerto Rico and other damaged areas
In the wake of hurricanes that have inflicted devastation on Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Texas, and other areas, the Trump Administration has been slow to provide funds, fresh water, medicine, food, shelter, electrical power, and other kinds of relief. President Trump was silent about Puerto Rico during his State of the Union address.
On Monday, it was announced that FEMA would stop sending food and water to Puerto Rico. According to reports from Puerto Rico, many people still depend on FEMA rations.The Green Party calls this decision premature.
The Green Party continues to support independence, self-determination, and self-government for Puerto Rico and cancellation of the island's massive debt. Greens noted that the storms are evidence of increasing climate stability as average global temperatues continue to rise.
Real Resistance
Greens said that those who reduce The Resistance to "Restore Democrats to Power" are offering no resistance at all.
The Democratic Party, competing with the GOP for checks from the One Percent, has abandoned working people across the U.S. Both parties pretend that economic recoveries and prosperity for the corporate sector and the rich mean good news for everyone. In reality, wages have stagnated. Financial security and protections for working people continue to shrink.
Placing corporate-money Democrats back in public office will be an invitation for future GOP victories, with the possibility of Republicans even worse than Trump.
Real resistance means changing the dangerous direction of the U.S., which can only begin to happen by opening the political field to more than the Two Parties of War and Wall Street.
Donald Trump won the 2016 election because voters who didn't want Hillary Clinton prevailed over voters who didn't want Mr. Trump. In other words -- more than any other reason -- we got President Trump because of the two-party election dynamic.
The Green Party has an alternative vision for the future of America, for working people, and for Planet Earth. That vision can become a reality when millions of Americans declare their independence from the two neoliberal parties and business as usual.
See also:
Green Party marks Dr. King's birthday, 50th anniversary of Poor People's Campaign
Press release: Green Party of the United States, January 15, 2018
Video: Statement on Dr. King's birthday by Deanna Dee Taylor
Green Party Women's Caucus urges passage of HR bill upholding human rights for children
Press release: Green Party of the United States, January 3, 2018
Green Party: Democrats and Republicans have launched an evidence-free McCarthyite campaign to discredit Jill Stein and Greens
Press release: Green Party of the United States, December 20, 2017
Green Party leaders speak out against the Republican tax bill
Press release: Green Party of the United States, December 13, 2017
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ICE Goons Pepper Spray Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva During Tucson Raid
"If federal agents are brazen enough to fire pellets directly at a member of Congress, imagine how they behave when encountering defenseless members of our community," Grijalva said.
Dec 05, 2025
In what Arizona's attorney general slammed as an "unacceptable and outrageous" act of "unchecked aggression," a federal immigration officer fired pepper spray toward recently sworn-in Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva during a Friday raid on a Tucson restaurant.
Grijalva (D-Ariz.) wrote on social media that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers "just conducted a raid by Taco Giro in Tucson—a small mom-and-pop restaurant that has served our community for years."
"When I presented myself as a member of Congress asking for more information, I was pushed aside and pepper sprayed," she added.
Grijalva said in a video uploaded to the post that she was "sprayed in the face by a very aggressive agent, pushed around by others, when I literally was not being aggressive, I was asking for clarification, which is my right as a member of Congress."
The video shows Grijalva among a group of protesters who verbally confronted federal agents over the raid. Following an order to "clear," an agent is seen firing what appears to be a pepper ball at the ground very near the congresswoman's feet. Video footage also shows agents deploying gas against the crowd.
"They're targeting small mom-and-pop businesses that don't have the financial resources to fight back," Grijalva told reporters after the incident. "They're targeting small businesses and people that are helping in our communities in order to try to fill the quota that [President Donald] Trump has given them."
Mocking the incident on social media, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin contended that Grijalva "wasn’t pepper sprayed."
"She was in the vicinity of someone who *was* pepper sprayed as they were obstructing and assaulting law enforcement," she added. "In fact, two law enforcement officers were seriously injured by this mob that [Grijalva] joined."
McLaughlin provided no further details regarding the nature of those injuries.
Democrats in Arizona and beyond condemned Friday's incident, with US Sen. Ruben Gallego writing on social media that Grijalva "was doing her job, standing up for her community."
"Pepper spraying a sitting member of Congress is disgraceful, unacceptable, and absolutely not what we voted for," he added. "Period."
Democratic Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes said on social media: "This is unacceptable and outrageous. Enforcing the rule of law does not mean pepper spraying a member of Congress for simply asking questions. Effective law enforcement requires restraint and accountability, not unchecked aggression."
Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) also weighed in on social media, calling the incident "outrageous."
"Rep. Grijalva was completely within her rights to stand up for her constituents," she added. "ICE is completely lawless."
Friday's incident follows federal agents' violent removal of Sen. Alexa Padilla (D-Calif.) from a June press conference held by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
Congresswoman LaMonica McIver (D-NJ) was federally indicted in June for allegedly “forcibly impeding and interfering with federal officers" during an oversight visit at a privately operated migrant detention center in Newark, New Jersey and subsequent confrontation with ICE agents outside of the lockup in which US Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Menendez, both New Jersey Democrats, were also involved.
Violent assaults by federal agents on suspected undocumented immigrants—including US citizens—protesters, journalists, and others are a regular occurrence amid the Trump administration's mass deportation campaign.
"If federal agents are brazen enough to fire pellets directly at a member of Congress, imagine how they behave when encountering defenseless members of our community," Grijalva said late Friday on social media. "It’s time for Congress to rein in this rogue agency NOW."
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Gavin Newsom Wants a 'Big Tent Party,' But Opposes Wealth Tax Supported by Large Majority of Americans
"A wealth tax is a big tent policy unless the only people you care about are billionaires," said one progressive organizer.
Dec 05, 2025
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, considered by some to be the frontrunner to be the next Democratic presidential nominee, said during a panel on Wednesday that he wants his party to be a “big tent” that welcomes large numbers of people into the fold. But he’s “adamantly against” one of the most popular proposals Democrats have to offer: a wealth tax.
In October, progressive economists Emmanuel Saez and Robert Reich joined forces with one of California's most powerful unions, the Service Employees International Union's (SEIU) United Healthcare Workers West, to propose that California put the nation’s first-ever wealth tax on the ballot in November 2026.
They described the measure as an "emergency billionaires tax" aimed at recouping the tens of billions of dollars that will be stripped from California's 15 million Medicaid recipients over the next five years, after Republicans enacted historic cuts to the program in July with President Donald Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which dramatically reduced taxes for the wealthiest Americans.
Among those beneficiaries were the approximately 200 billionaires living in California, whose average annual income, Saez pointed out, has risen by 7.5% per year, compared with 1.5% for median-income residents.
Under the proposal, they would pay a one-time 5% tax on their total net worth, which is estimated to raise $100 billion. The vast majority of the funds, about 90%, would be used to restore Medicaid funding, while the rest would go towards funding K-12 education, which the GOP has also slashed.
The proposal in California has strong support from unions and healthcare groups. But Newsom has called it “bad policy” and “another attempt to grab money for special purposes.”
Meanwhile, several of his longtime consultants, including Dan Newman and Brian Brokaw, have launched a campaign alongside “business and tech leaders” to kill the measure, which they’ve dubbed “Stop the Squeeze." They've issued familiar warnings that pinching the wealthy too hard will drive them from the state, along with the critical tax base they provide.
At Wednesday's New York Times DealBook Summit, Andrew Ross Sorkin asked Newsom about his opposition to the wealth tax idea, comparing it to a proposal by recent New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, who pledged to increase the income taxes of New Yorkers who earn more than $1 million per year by 2% in order to fund his city-wide free buses, universal childcare, and city-owned grocery store programs.
Mamdani's proposal was met with a litany of similar warnings from Big Apple bigwigs who threatened to flee the city and others around the country who said they'd never move in.
But as Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein explained in October for the American Prospect: "The evidence for this is thin: mostly memes shared by tech and finance people... Research shows that the truth of the matter is closer to the opposite. Wealthy individuals and their income move at lower rates than other income brackets, even in response to an increase of personal income tax." Many of those who sulked about Mamdani's victory have notably begun making amends with the incoming mayor.
Moreover, the comparison between Mamdani's plan and the one proposed in California is faulty to begin with. As Harold Meyerson explained, also for the Prospect: "It is a one-time-only tax, to be levied exclusively on billionaires’ current (i.e., 2025) net worth. Even if they move to Tasmania, they will still be liable for 5% of this year’s net worth."
"Crucially, the tax won’t crimp the fortunes of any billionaire who moves into the state next year or any later year, as it only applies to the billionaires living in the state this year," he added. "Therefore... the horrific specter of billionaire flight can’t be levied against the California proposal."
Nevertheless, Sorkin framed Newsom as being in an existential battle of ideas with Mamdani, asking how the two could both represent the Democratic Party when they are so "diametrically opposed."
"Well, I want to be a big-tent party," Newsom replied. "It's about addition, not subtraction."
Pushed on the question of whether there should be a "unifying theory of the case," Newsom responded that “we all want to be protected, we all want to be respected, we all want to be connected to something bigger than ourselves. We have fundamental values that I think define our party, about social justice, economic justice.”
"We have pre-distribution Democrats, and we have re-distribution Democrats," he continued. "Therein lies the dialectic and therein lies the debate."
Polling is scarce so far on the likelihood of such a measure passing in California. But nationally, polls suggest that the vast majority of Democrats fall on the "re-distribution" side of Newsom's "dialectic." In fact, the majority of all Americans do, regardless of party affiliation.
Last year, Inequality.org examined 55 national and state polls about a number of different taxation policies and found:
A billionaire income tax garnered the most support across party identification. On average, two out of three (67%) of Americans supported the tax including 84% of Democrats, 64% of Independents, and 51% of Republicans.
In national polls, a wealth tax had similarly high levels of support. More than three out of five Americans supported the tax including 78% of Democrats, 62% of Independents, and 51% of Republicans.
That sentiment only seems to have grown since the return of President Donald Trump. An Economist/YouGov poll released in early November found that 72% of Americans said that taxes on billionaires should be raised—including 95% of Democrats, 75% of independents, and 48% of Republicans. Across the board, just 15% said they should not be raised.
Support remains high when the proposal is more specific as well. On the eve of Mamdani's election, despitre months of fearmongering, 64% of New Yorkers said they backed his proposal, including a slight plurality of self-identified conservatives, according to a Siena College poll.
Many observers were perplexed by how Newsom proposes to maintain a “big tent” while opposing policies supported by most of the people inside it.
"A wealth tax is a big tent policy unless the only people you care about are billionaires," wrote Jonathan Cohn, the political director for Progressive Mass, a grassroots organization in Massachusetts, on social media.
"Gavin Newsom—estimated net worth between $20 and $30 million—says he's opposed to a billionaire wealth tax. Color me shocked," wrote the Columbia University lecturer Anthony Zenkus. "Democrats holding him up as a potential savior for 2028 is a clear example of not reading the room."
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Supreme Court Agrees to Hear Case That Could Bless Trump's Bid to End Birthright Citizenship
"That the Supreme Court is actually entertaining Trump’s unconstitutional attack on birthright citizenship is the clearest example yet that the Roberts Court is broken beyond repair," said one critic.
Dec 05, 2025
The United States Supreme Court on Friday agreed to decide whether US President Donald Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship—as guaranteed under the 14th Amendment for more than 150 years—is constitutional.
Next spring, the justices will hear oral arguments in Trump's appeal of a lower court ruling that struck down parts of an executive order—titled Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship—signed on the first day of the president's second term. Under the directive, which has not taken effect due to legal challenges, people born in the United States would not be automatically entitled to US citizenship if their parents are in the country temporarily or without legal authorization.
Enacted in 1868, the 14th Amendment affirms that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside."
While the Trump administration argues that the 14th Amendment was adopted to grant US citizenship to freed slaves, not travelers or undocumented immigrants, two key Supreme Court cases have affirmed birthright citizenship under the Constitution—United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898) and Afroyim v. Rusk (1967).
Here is the question presented. It's a relatively clean vehicle for the Supreme Court to finally decide whether it is lawful for the president to deny birthright citizenship to the children of immigrants. www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/25...
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— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjsdc.bsky.social) December 5, 2025 at 10:55 AM
Several district court judges have issued universal preliminary injunctions to block Trump's order. However, the Supreme Court's right-wing supermajority found in June that “universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts."
In July, a three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit unanimously ruled that executive order is an unconstitutional violation of the plain language of the 14th Amendment. In total, four federal courts and two appellate courts have blocked Trump's order.
“No president can change the 14th Amendment’s fundamental promise of citizenship,” Cecillia Wang, national legal director at the ACLU—which is leading the nationwide class action challenge to Trump's order—said in a statement Friday. “We look forward to putting this issue to rest once and for all in the Supreme Court this term.”
Brett Edkins, managing director of policy and political affairs at the advocacy group Stand Up America, was among those who suggested that the high court justices should have refused to hear the case given the long-settled precedent regarding the 14th Amendment.
“This case is a right-wing fantasy, full stop. That the Supreme Court is actually entertaining Trump’s unconstitutional attack on birthright citizenship is the clearest example yet that the Roberts Court is broken beyond repair," Edkins continued, referring to Chief Justice John Roberts.
"Even if the court ultimately rules against Trump, in a laughable display of its supposed independence, the fact that fringe attacks on our most basic rights as citizens are being seriously considered is outrageous and alarming," he added.
Aarti Kohli, executive director of the Asian Law Caucus, said that “it’s deeply troubling that we must waste precious judicial resources relitigating what has been settled constitutional law for over a century," adding that "every federal judge who has considered this executive order has found it unconstitutional."
Tianna Mays, legal director for Democracy Defenders Fund, asserted, “The attack on the fundamental right of birthright citizenship is an attack on the 14th Amendment and our Constitution."
"We are confident the court will affirm this basic right, which has stood for over a century," Mays added. "Millions of families across the country deserve and require that clarity and stability.”
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