Trump 2025 Joint Session Fact Check
Debunking Trump's disinformation speech with all the receipts
I watched Trump’s 2025 Joint Session speech so you wouldn’t have to—and here are the results. Donald Trump spent about half the 100 minute diatribe demonizing immigrants, and the other half rambling on everything from oil, to forcibly taking Greenland and the Panama Canal, to demonizing DEI and Trans Americans, to trying desperately to convince Americans that a trade war via tariffs would be good for our economy. At no point did Trump mention Medicaid, Abortion, or Gun Safety. His mentions of Climate Change, the Middle East, Race relations, and law and order were to poke fun at Democrats or play victim himself. Here’s the breakdown and key points you’ll want to be aware of. Let’s Address This.
Fact Checking Trump’s Disinformation SOTU
Claim: We’ve accomplished more in 43 days than most administrations have in 8 years, and we’re just getting started
Fact Check: In reality Trump has so far signed one piece of legislation into law, the fascist inspired Laken Riley Act. More on this later. Executive Orders are not legislation and do not carry the weight of legislation. Signing EOs to dismantle regulatory agencies, fire military judges, and build concentration camps are not “accomplishments,” unless you’re trying to become “America’s Hitler,” as JD Vance once remarked.
Claim: Trump claimed the Presidential Election of November 5 was a “mandate like has not been seen in many decades.” He added, “For the first time in modern history more Americans believe our country is headed in the right direction than in the wrong direction. A 27 point swing, the most ever.”
Fact Check: In reality, the November 5 election was one of the closest in modern history. Moreover, no discoverable poll suggests that majority of Americans think America is headed in the right direction, and every poll I could find suggests the exact opposite. e.g. A poll taken just this week says 34% of Americans say America is headed in the right direction while 49% say wrong direction.
Claim: Trump claims “Small Biz optimism saw its biggest jump ever recorded. A 41 point jump.”
Fact Check: In reality, The National Federal of Independent Business, which tracks small business optimism, reported to the contrary. In its January 2025 survey, NFIB holds that Small Biz Optimism fell 2.3% in January 2025.
NOTE: Speaker Johnson issued a decorum warning to Rep Al Green of Texas, who was protesting Trump’s speech. Rep Green refused to stop protesting, so Speaker Johnson then had Rep Green forcibly removed. Republicans chanted “na na na na hey hey hey good bye.”
Claim: Many have stated that the first month of our presidency is the most successful in the history of our nation. They’re saying #2 is George Washington.
Fact Check: In reality, nobody is saying this. Trump is making things up.
Claim: Trump says this despite this being his 5th speech, there is nothing he can say to Dems to make them stand or smile. “I could find a cure to disease, create greatest economy, or stop crimes, and these people will not stand for these astronomical achievements.”
Fact Check: In reality, Trump has not actually achieved any of those things. On the contrary his incompetence led to mass death under COVID, the economy sputtered under his previous Presidency, and he did nothing to actually reduce crime. Instead, he pardoned 1600 violent white supremacist insurrectionists. A reminder that every MAGA claim is a confession.
Claim: Trump claims America is better now because he:
Terminated the “Green new Scam,”
Withdrew from Paris Climate Accord that apparently cost us Trillions of dollars.
Withdrew from corrupt WHO.
Withdrew from UN Human Rights council.
Ended Biden’s environmental restrictions because they were unaffordable and made us less safe.
Ended EV mandate, saving our workers from economic destruction.
Fact Check: In reality:
The Green New Deal was never law, and if it was, he couldn’t terminate it by EO.
The Paris Climate Accords did not cost us Trillions of dollars and Trump has zero evidence to back up this claim.
Withdrawing health regulations is what enabled COVID to spread quicker than it would have otherwise.
We’re well aware that Trump does not value human rights.
Trump provides zero examples of how climate justice makes us less safe. On the contrary climate justice better secures human rights.
Studies already prove the EV mandate both helped the climate and boosted sales for automakers.
Claim: Trump brags that under his administration, for every 1 new regulation, 10 old regulations must be eliminated, and doing so will “unshackle our economy.”
Fact Check: In reality, the only thing this deregulation will “unshackle” is safety. As I’ve written before, studies show that Trump’s absurd deregulation strategy resulted in the FAA admitting they were prevented from passing critical safety regulations, that could have prevented airline accidents. In fact, I’ve written in detail on how Republican deregulation has resulted in the collapse of numerous industries, and sadly, it is expected to happen again now.
Claim: Trump claims he has stopped all government censorship and brought back free speech in America.
Fact Check: In reality, Trump has done the opposite. He has banned even discussing DEI under penalty of termination. He has criminalized peaceful protest, literally yesterday tweeting this nonsensical tirade:
Apparently, Nazis wearing Camp Auschwitz shirts, beating cops to death, and smearing feces on the halls of Congress = Free Speech and Full Pardon, while students peacefully protesting genocide of Palestinians funded by US tax dollars = Illegal Agitators. For Trump, “free speech” is anything that advances white supremacy, even violently, and illegal speech is anything that demands justice, even peacefully.
Claim: Trump says English is now the official language of the United States because he signed an EO making English the official language of the USA.
Fact Check: In reality, an Executive Order does not undo legislation. The Supreme Court and HHS have already interpreted Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act—both of which prohibit discrimination on the basis of “national origin”—to include language. The irony of course is that Trump’s grandfather, a criminal undocumented immigrant who arrived in 1917, himself could not speak English when he arrived. So if Trump’s EO was actual law throughout American history, the Trump family may never have been welcomed on America’s shores.
Claim: Trump claims that he “ended the tyranny of DEI policies all across the entire government and military and private sector. Our country will be ‘woke no longer.” He adds, “We believe you should be hired on skill and competence, not race and gender. You should be hired based on merit.”
Fact Check: As I’ve already written in detail, DEI is literally merit based hiring, and if Trump actually cared about meritocracy, he would abolish Legacy admissions, which near exclusively benefits unqualified white applicants.
Claim: We have removed the poison of CRT from public schools.
Fact Check: As I’ve already documented, public schools never taught Critical Race Theory. A reminder that words like “woke,” “DEI,” and “CRT” are all used because modern white supremacists find that easier to say than the N-word to discriminate against Black people.
Claim: We have made it policy that there are only two genders, male and female, and signed an EO banning men from playing in women’s sports, and will cut federal funding to any school who does not comply.
Fact Check: Trump is announcing he doesn’t believe in science. As a baseline, about 1.7% of people are born Intersex. The science tells us that, “Intersex people are born with sex characteristics (such as sexual anatomy, reproductive organs, hormonal patterns and/or chromosomal patterns) that do not fit typical binary notions of male or female bodies.” Trump called it “demeaning to women,” to allow trans athletes to compete, which is especially offensive given more women have accused him of sexual assault (27) than there are trans athletes (10) among 500,000+ college athletes. It’s also offensive given Trump’s repeal of DEI and Affirmative Action will do far more to harm tens of millions of women than any ban on trans athletes could ever “help” women. This is another culture war Trump will continue to cite to elevate violence and hate against Trans people, while distracting from his own failed policies as he bankrupts our nation and the working class.
Claim: Trump alleged his:
“top priority is to rescue our economy” and claimed “We inherited an economic catastrophe and an inflation nightmare.” He added “America suffered the worst inflation in the history of our country under Biden,” who also let the prices of eggs get out of control. Trump plans to “defeat inflation by reducing the cost of energy.”
He alleged Biden cut new oil leases by 95%, closed 100 power plants, and that Trump is reopening those power plants. Trump also claims that his administration will drill for oil in our own country.
He alleged that Japan and South Korea want to invest “trillions” of dollars into an Alaska natural gas pipeline.
Fact Check: In reality,
The average year-over-year inflation under Biden was 4.95%, which was still the lowest among developed nations globally in the post-COVID inflation era. As far as U.S. history, Nixon had 6.01%, Ford had 8.11%, and Carter had 9.85%. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the highest inflation in US History was in 1917 at 20.17% and in 1778 at 29.78%. By the way, Trump’s inflation of 2.46% was a full percent higher than Obama’s inflation of 1.46%. Also, eggs are higher priced now than they were under Biden, largely due to the spreading bird flu, which Trump has done absolutely nothing to address.
Biden actually approved more onshore drilling than did Trump, a fact that many on the left are still bitter about. The fact that Trump is attacking Biden on this anyway should be another wake up call to Democrats to stop trying to appease Republicans, and start trying to do what’s right and what your base wants.
Japanese officials have made clear they have not agreed to participate in the pipeline, let alone invest “trillions” of dollars.
Claim: Trump claims he “Created DOGE to end flagrant waste of taxpayer dollars.” Then after praising Elon musk, he cited alleged waste. The list is too long to dive into here, but suffice it to say, DOGE has provided zero actual evidence of waste. I’ll point to just three examples of Trump’s lies here. Trump claims DOGE found as waste:
$22B from HHS to provide free housing and cars for illegal aliens.
$45M for DEI scholarships in Burma
$8M for making mice transgender.
Fact Check: None of the above is a typo, the President of the United States Actually said this. All in all Trump estimates annual fraud of over $500B in our nation—which might actually be true if we audited the Pentagon, but that isn’t something Trump is willing to do. In reality:
This claim originates from the right wing tabloid, the Murdoch owned NY Post, which itself cites a right wing blogger’s opinion. There’s zero actual evidence backing up this claim from any independent or non-partisan watch dog org.
This is part of Trump shutting down USAID. The $45M were funds committed to help 400 students from lower income backgrounds get access to education and opportunities otherwise deemed impossible. None of this is actual waste, but it is incredibly cruel to promise, then deny students the opportunity to learn.
I was unable to find any actual evidence of this, nor has Trump offered any actual evidence of this, but I suspect the actual story is more than what’s been offered without evidence.
EDIT: As suspected, the actual story is Trump ignorantly was referring to transgenic mice, which are used to discover new cures for different diseases and cancers in a safe environment. In other words, Trump bragged about cutting $8M from disease research, and did so while demonizing and dehumanizing Trans Americans. Beyond absurd.
Suffice it to say, the rest of Trump’s reckless evidenceless claims follow this protocol—make a claim, don’t offer evidence, require blind acceptance. He does love the poorly educated, after all.
Claim: Trump alleges “probable fraud in our Social Security program” with his “evidence” a long list of tens of millions of Americans allegedly well over 100 years old getting, some even more than 200 years old.
Fact Check: I’ll even be so bold as to quote Fox News to show how truly unhinged Trump is on this lie:
In 2015, the SSA and its inspector general looked into the number of people in the system with no death record who were listed as being over the age of 112. SSA found 6.5 million number holders aged 112 or older with no death information in the system, but noted that other records suggested the majority of them were deceased. Of those, SSA issued payments to 266 number holders — though the IG's review indicated only 13 beneficiaries were likely age 112 or older, while in the remaining 253 cases there were discrepancies in SSA's records that indicated the beneficiary wasn't actually that old.
So not only did Trump lie, he lied so badly that he even lost Fox News, and yet worse, he’s tried to fire the Inspector General who is responsible to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse at the Social Security Administration.
Claim: Trump claims he’s going to balance the federal budget for the first time in 24 years.
Fact Check: In 2017 Trump claimed he’s eliminate the debt in 4 years, and instead added more to the national debt than any President in American history. This time will likely be no different, especially considering his planned $4.5T tax giveaway to billionaires.
Claim: Trump went on extensive rants alleging that immigrants cause crime, are being released here from insane asylums, have killed ‘hundreds of thousands’ of Americans, and “entire towns like Springfield, Ohio are buckling under the migrant occupation.” He also praised the Laken Riley Act.
Fact Check: In reality, we’ve debunked Trump’s claims against migrants numerous times. We’ve demonstrated with facts that immigrants and undocumented immigrants have always had lower crime rates than US citizens, that immigrants in a community makes that community statistically safer, consistently healthier, consistently more economically prosperous, and consistently with better and tastier food options. Please feel free to revisit my viral article Debunking 7 Common MAGA Myths on Immigration. Likewise, as well discussed, the Laken Riley Act is an extremist piece of legislation that undermines due process of law, and is Trump’s vehicle to fill his 30,000 person concentration camp in Cuba. As the American Immigration Council reports:
The bill eliminates due process for many immigrants, including some who have been living and working legally in the U.S. for years. Under this law, they would be placed in indefinite detention if accused—not convicted—of low-level crimes like shoplifting. That could include children who are mistakenly arrested and accused of crimes they did not commit.
This is not law and order. This is not justice. This is fascism.
Claim: Trump says he will restore true democracy again by reclaiming power from unaccountable bureaucrats, declaring, “The days of rule by unelected bureaucrats are over.”
Fact Check: Trump said this without a hint of irony that the wealthiest man in the world is an unelected bureaucrat who is unaccountable yet able to decide who gets to keep a job and who gets fired in the Federal government. Again, every MAGA accusation is a confession.
Claim: Trump said his first term economy was “the most successful economy in the history of this country.”
Fact Check: It was not. Politifact already rated this claim FALSE, with receipts.
Claim: Trump again praised tariffs and how they will strengthen American workers and American farmers.
Fact Check: As has been repeatedly documented, tariffs are not paid by overseas manufacturers, but by American consumers. As the non-partisan Tax Foundation reports:
[C]ontrary to President Trump’s claims, Americans will bear the costs of the next trade war in the form of lower incomes as tariffs cause prices of imported goods to rise. With polls showing Americans remain highly concerned about prices and inflation, it would be wise to avoid policies that further erode Americans’ standard of living.
Claim: Trump went on a lengthy rant about taking care of police, restoring law and order, and issuing a mandatory death penalty for anyone who murders police officers.
Fact Check: Someone should remind Trump that he pardoned 1600 violent white supremacist insurrectionists who enabled the deaths of up to six police officers, and injured hundreds more. As I’ve written before, if we want safer communities, we need to invest in public safety, not lethal state power to kill people.
Claim: Trump claims America built the Panama Canal for Americans. 38,000 Americans died building it.
Fact Check: In actuality it was about 25,000 workers, of which 350 were Americans, which is tragic to be sure, but it demonstrates how Trump was merely 99.3% off.
Claim: Trump wants to adopt Greenland into the United States for national security, says it is up to the people of Greenland, and then added with a sinister smile, “one way or another we’re gonna get it.”
Fact Check: This is imperialism. Taking another country “one way or another” is illegal and an international war crime. As I’ve written before, Trump is laying the groundwork to commit mass war crimes, and we need Dem leadership to stop being complacent and act immediately to stop him.
Claim: Trump says in the next four years we are going to “plant the American flag on Mars and even far beyond.”
Fact Check: Trump is making this claim based on Elon Musk, who claimed in 2011 he’d put a man on Mars in 10 years.
Claim: Trump blamed ‘radical islamic terrorism’ and Biden for why 13 soldiers were killed during the Afghan withdrawal
Fact Check: Islamophobia remains an acceptable form of bigotry in American politics, with no politician bothering to condemn this hate. Moreover, Trump ignores that he is the one that negotiated the withdrawal and forced the timeline at hand. Finally, Trump hopes people forget that he forced the Afghan government to release 5000 Taliban terrorists, and that with zero concessions in return. The art of the deal huh?
Final Point: This final point is not so much a fact check, but I feel the need to call out the cruelty and absurdity of how Trump used a sweet innocent Black child as a prop. The child, named DJ, is a cancer survivor, and dreams of becoming a police officer. Trump reminded everyone that per DJ’s doctors, he likely got cancer due to contamination from chemicals. It is not lost on me the absurdity of Trump using a Black child cancer survivor who got cancer from chemicals and wants to be a cop as his prop when Trump has:
Cut child cancer funding
Gutted the EPA
Deregulated sewage in our water (literally yesterday SCOTUS ruled 5-4 doing so)
Pardoned J6 insurrectionists who killed cops
Wants to give cops qualified immunity, rather than address the epidemic of police violence on Black communities
Conclusion
Trump’s speech lasted 100 minutes, and it was a propaganda masterclass to appease his base with red meat, dehumanize those who oppose him, and not offer any meaningful solutions to the problems that impact society. At a time when we are in a healthcare crisis, Trump refused to even utter the word healthcare, much less acknowledge that his budget bill and tax cut will cut $880 billion from Medicaid. At a time of gun violence ravaging our nation, Trump did not mention it even once. And as working people are crushed under wealth and income inequality, Trump instead aggressively sold his $4.5T tax scam to help his billionaire cronies.
Democratic leadership needs to get their act together. We are way past time alarm bells are going off. Trump fancies himself a king, not a President, and we are well on the path to autocracy and fascism.
So all that said, my closing message is still very much this: the future may look bleak, yes, but I ask each of you to reflect and embrace the words of James Baldwin in these trying times, when he said:
I never have been in despair about the world. I’ve been enraged by it. I don’t think I’m in despair. I can’t afford despair. I can’t tell my nephew, my niece. You can’t tell the children there’s no hope.
Let us maintain hope in each other, in our Republic, and in the promise that we can form a more perfect Union by upholding justice above all else. My commitment over these next four years and beyond will be to continue to advocate for absolute justice in my writing and actions, sharing factual and honest analysis of the human rights issues that impact us all. I cannot do this alone, and am grateful for your support. You can see the amount of time and research it took to write this piece. So, whether you can subscribe for free, or for a cup of coffee a month ($6), your support goes a long way towards helping build this movement for justice.
We have a tough road ahead, but we are not hopeless, and we will not give up our voice. Let’s get to work.
They are transgenic mice, not transgender mice. Essential for cancer research. He is a moron, and so is everyone else who participated in putting this speech together who didn't catch that.
Calling Congress together to tell them one of your accomplishments is renaming a mountain is 2nd grader energy