The assignment of responding the State of the Union is
thirsty work.
It's a little bit like what used to be called
the the Sports Illustrated Cover curse in the sense that
it is a great honor.
It means you are a big deal and have done
some great stuff and people expect more great stuff from
you.
But it often doesn't go well for you.
The person who will deliver tonight's Republican response
is Katie Britt, a freshman senator from the great state
of Alabama.
She was sworn in last year.
She's the first woman from Alabama to be elected to
the US Senate.
At just age 42. She's also the youngest woman ever
elected to the US Senate from any state
senator. Britt's an interesting and strategic choice for Republicans.
She ran on her staunch opposition to abortion.
She celebrated the overturning of Roe versus Wade.
Republicans have since lost election after election after election anytime
it's been tied to that subject in any state,
even dark red states where it's gone up on the
ballot in various ways
after the Alabama Supreme Court effectively banned in vitro fertilization,
effectively banned IVF last month.
Alabama State Legislature subsequently rushed through a bill to protect
it.
The Alabama governor signed that bill last night,
which happened to be on the literal eve of Senator
Katie Britt's national debut.
Lucky her. Joining us now is our friend John Archibald.
He's a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter and columnist for
al.com. John, it's great to see you.
Thanks for being with us tonight.
Good to see you too.
Thanks for having me. So you have seen Katie Britt
up close in Alabama politics for a lot longer than
people
on the national scene know her.
What should we expect, and what have you come to
learn about her
in her years in Alabama politics?
Well, you know, she came to power sort of as
an alternative sort of
a politician to to the craziness of the MO Brooks's
of the world and the buffoonery of Tommy Tuberville and
that sort of thing.
And I think that she wants to present that sort
of image to,
you know, the nation as as sort of an alternative
to crazy.
But
at the same time if you really want to see
who she is,
you have to look at sort of the Republican
Party that that exists you know in her state which
is
you know busy right as we speak.
You know, passing more don't say gay bills and and
more bathroom bills and
ignoring prison crises that that that also affect life.
And so you know, if that's
if that's the that's
what you're going to get from Katie Britt and and
probably anything that
that she thinks Donald Trump might want to hear.
So she was up against MO Brooks
in the primary to get to this Senate seat in
the 1st place.
MO Brooks started off as very much Team Trump and
then Trump sort of turned on him,
effectively disassociated himself with him in a way that was
very harmful for Mr.
Brooks campaign. Katie Britt ended up winning that campaign by
a lot after Trump and Brooks split.
I mean we all saw that drama unfold.
But where would you put her on the scale of
0 to Trumpy
in terms of what what type of Republican politics she
has,
how closely she's aligned herself with the former president and
crucially, with his, his claims about
elections being fraudulent in the United States?
Yeah,
it's really interesting because when she went around campaigning here,
initially,
tons of people would say,
oh, but she's not like that and she's not like
that.
She really doesn't believe that she's not that Trumpy,
which only leads me to say,
you know, you are what you pretend to be.
And in the time that she's been elected,
she has pretended to be nothing but,
you know, a a Trump shoe Shiner.
And I think that she intends to,
she hopes deeply to be put in that
vice presidential lottery. So.
So I think that in many ways it's sort of
an illusion because because she has been,
the result is exactly the same.
If you had Tommy Tuberville saying crazy things and you
have
Katie Brett who is saying
less crazy things, but ultimately the result is the same.
And and I think that's where we are.
John Archibald, Pulitzer Prize winning reporter and columnist for
al.com, one of of all the people writing
columns, journalism in the United States.
My favorite person to read of all of them.
John, it's it's great to have you here.
Thank you, my friend.
Thank you. We see live shots from the chamber here
as Vice President Kamala Harris enters the chamber.
We also saw the Democratic Senate leader,
Chuck Schumer, the Republican Senate leader,
Mitch McConnell coming in behind her.
This, this starts the process,
a long process which will take
at least the next 20 minutes
as as you see members of the House and Senate
already there.
And we'll see the diplomatic corps of the cabinet,
the,
the the, the Joint Chiefs,
the military leaders of the various branches
all come in. We'll keep eyes on that as it
happens Chris
oh I just Katie Britt is a fascinating figure.
She was you know choice and choice she were I
mean clearly look they understand they have to protect themselves
on this flank.
They they they have coordinated this timing right like she's
coming to be like look we signed the IVF bill
we're not coming for your frozen embryos.
You know IVF universes of America.
Even though the majority of the House Republican caucus is
currently,
as I speak to you right now,
a Co sponsors on a bill that's filed in this
Congress that would nationalize the Alabama court ruling that has
no carve out for IVF.
But the other thing that I think is interesting is
like the sort of
expectation setting that happens when you're the senator in a
state where Tommy Tuberville's the other senator.
It's like it's like it's like a it's like a
bridesmaid's dress for reasonableness. You
know what I mean? Like you look good.
If you're next to Tommy Tuberville who is one of
the most like embarrassing ludicrous members of the US Senate.
I can editorialize. Katie Britt is like extremely,
extremely
respected and look to as like the future in Republican
Senate circles.
She was a staffer for a long time.
She was chief of staff to Richard Shelby who she
replaced whose seat she now holds right now.
And so she is, she is an interesting kind of
inside outside
transcender in this generation of of younger public.
She's also the only Republican woman in the Senate with
kids
and who are like, you know,
she said she's raising, which is why probably she is
their choice.
It is still odd. I understand they have to like
protect their right flank at the same time.
This is the biggest problem they have.
And when she won her Senate seat,
she proudly, you know, brags it was excited about the
row being over.
Yeah. I mean so that
she could be like Republican Gandhi.
And she still possesses a position that totally that
83% of American right House
abortion is more popular now than it has been since
the poll question has been asked.
And Republicans radical extreme Republicans have made it so it
doesn't matter her reasonable.
She looks next to Tommy Taberville.
Right. Well and on the question they don't have an
answer.
I mean Alabama did sort of an end run around
it but they're not answering the fundamental quote UN quote
moral questions that they brought up.
So it's like answered it.
They, I mean embryos are children and it's in the
concert.
Doesn't matter that they pass.
It's over. Does that mean you can freeze children.
I mean you know like that's the when you're defending
frozen children.
You know you're right.
Exactly. Beyond that they also have I think Johnson's invited
someone who runs a pregnancy crisis center.
I mean, they're not doing themselves any he favors.
Visa V, you know the larger kind of questions that
came out of Dobbs,
what's really one of the key dynamics in this election
is that
if the if everyone was smart on that side,
they would just shut the hell up about this issue
until November.
Like they would just be like no one talk about
it.
We're not doing a national ban.
Wait till we get in power and then we'll do
every.
But they can't do that.
They can't do that on this because it is their
strongest issue.
No, but they also they're right.
We keep talking. They're gonna keep talking right when they'll
keep dying.
And the problem is local news still exists.
And even the right wing local news will still cover
a woman who has died because she was not able
to get health care in the state.
Even of Texas, it will still be covered.
It's going to happen in Ohio and Texas.
It's going to happen in Florida.
It will happen everywhere. And those stories are so compelling,
just as narratives that they will,
they'll be irresistible to the media,
local and national, as women die.
It doesn't matter how attractive and reasonable sounding Katie Britt
is.
And the reality is the polling on this among the
Republican base,
I think it's something like
only 35% of the Republican Party disagrees with the Alabama
ruling.
No. But Mike Johnson, I don't know if if you
all saw the Mike Johnson interview today because he was
asked about IVF,
couldn't answer it. And what he said was it's new
since the
1970s and we're in a brave new world.
First of all, he's probably been around since the 19.
I mean, he's younger. I mean he's not that much.
He's been around about 1970s.
Yes, that's my point. Right.
Right. And the other issue is that the problem and
I I look,
I, I, I come from the 1980s like I was
in ice well the 1980s.
And I'm just telling you when we first started hearing
about this and the whole quote UN quote test tube
baby.
The right I'm just promising you as somebody who grew
up Christian in the
1980s was Foursquare against it declared it to be demonic
and did not believe it should happen.
They believe life begins at conception and if you create
12 embryos,
they believe you must implant all 12 and make all
12 embryos into people because they're already people.
They if you say life begins at conception,
that means that by definition,
if you dispose of a of an embryo you frozen,
you have killed a person.
That is what they actually believe.
They can cover it up with whatever marketing and slogans
and a different messenger,
but that is what they actually believe.
And while we're talking and we're looking at these scenes
from inside,
there's Tommy Tuberville seniors that.
But if you when we've had those wide shots of
the room,
you might have noticed that there's a lot of female
members of Congress who are wearing white or wearing cream
light colored.
And it's it really stands out when you see the
wider shot of the room.
Those are members of the Democratic women's caucus who are
wearing white specifically to signal support for reproductive freedom.
And so this is going to be the centerpiece
of what happens tonight, almost regardless of what has said,
what is being said right?
With the Republicans choosing a Republican from Alabama to give
the response to the state of the union and anti
abortion Republican from Alabama and to have the Democratic women
highlighting it in this very high visibility.
Can I make a start?