Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds delivered the Republican response to President Biden’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, criticizing the Biden administration on crime, inflation, and Russia’s place on the earth, saying it feels just like the U.S. has reverted to the late 70s and early 80s.
Reynolds mentioned she’s “fearful our nation is on the improper observe,” and the president’s strategy has been “too little, too late.”
“As a substitute of transferring America ahead, it seems like President Biden and his get together have despatched us again in time to the late ’70s and early ’80s, when runaway inflation was hammering households, a violent crime wave was crashing on our cities, and the Soviet military was attempting to redraw the world map,” she mentioned.
Earlier than he took workplace, the president pledged restoration overseas and unity at dwelling, she mentioned.
Picture Courtesy of the Committee on Preparations/the 2020 Republican Nationwide Committee by way of Getty Photos
“He is failed on each fronts,” Reynolds mentioned, harkening again to the “disastrous” Afghanistan withdrawal.
The opposing get together’s number of an individual to ship the response to the State of the Union is all the time carefully watched, usually signaling the place the get together desires to go and probably figuring out somebody the get together sees as an up-and-coming chief. Reynolds, a grandmother of 11 and Iowa’s first feminine governor, has been in workplace since 2017.
Reynolds mentioned the Biden administration “believes inflation is a ‘high-class drawback,'” however that wasn’t true many years in the past, and is not now, she mentioned.
“I can let you know it is an all people drawback,” she mentioned. “I noticed mothers’ and dads’ paychecks purchase them much less and fewer. I watched working individuals selecting which necessities to take dwelling and which of them to go away behind. And now President Biden’s choices have a complete new era feeling that very same ache.”
“Fortunately,” the president’s social spending plan — the Construct Again Higher Act — did not move, she mentioned, noting that members of the president’s personal get together blocked it.
Reynolds additionally honed in on faculties and parental rights, one thing that has been a spotlight for Republicans in the course of the pandemic and arguably helped Governor Glenn Youngkin win in Virginia in November. She blasted Democrats for requiring masks in faculties, whereas some go unmasked themselves. Iowa was the primary state within the nation to require faculties to open in individual in the course of the pandemic, Reynolds famous.
“I used to be attacked by the left; I used to be attacked by the media. But it surely wasn’t a tough selection. It was the correct selection,” she mentioned. “And retaining faculties open is just the beginning of the pro-parent, pro-family revolution that Republicans are main in Iowa and states throughout this nation. Republicans imagine that oldsters matter. It was true earlier than the pandemic and has by no means been extra necessary to say out loud: Mother and father Matter. They’ve a proper to know, and to have a say in, what their youngsters are being taught.”
Reynolds urged Mr. Biden to place his religion within the American individuals, “who’ve by no means waived in your perception on this nation, no matter who leads it.”
As Reynolds delivered her remarks, Republican Nationwide Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel mentioned the president’s speech “confirmed he fails to know the damage his insurance policies have brought on American households.”
“He didn’t take accountability for his failures, provided no actual options to the various crises Individuals are dealing with, and as a substitute doubled down on his disastrous and polarizing agenda,” McDaniel mentioned. “Individuals are struggling and Biden as soon as once more ignored them. Republicans will maintain Biden and Democrats accountable in November.”
