joe joe burgess, generations of union steelworkers in pittsburgh. where are you, jojo? thanks, buddy. as ohio senator sherrod brown says, it's time to bury the label rust belt. it's timeo see what used to be called the rust belt become the whole significant resurgence of manufacturing. and with all the bright spots in our economy, record job growth, higher wages, too many families are struggling to keep up with their bills. inflation is robbing them of gains they thought otherwise they would be able to feel. i get it. that's why my top priority is getting prices under control. look, our economy roared back faster than almost anyone predicted, but the pandemic meant that businesses had a hard time hiring enough people because of the pandemic to keep up production in their factories. so we didn't have people making those beams that went into building because the factories were closed. the pandemic also disrupted the global supply train -- supply chain. when that happens it takes longer to make goods and get them from warehouses to the stores and prices go up. one third of all the inflation was because of automobile sales. there weren't enough semiconductors to make all the cars that people wanted to buy. and guess what? the prices of automobiles went way up. especially used vehicles as well. and so we have a choice. one way to fight inflation that is driving down wages that makes americans poor. i think i have a better idea to fight inflation. lower costs, not your wages. that means make more cars and semiconductors in america. more infrastructure and invation in america. more goods, moving faster and cheaper in america. more jobs or you can earn a good living in america. instead of relying on foreign supply chains, let's make it in america. look, economists -- >> usa! usa! pres. biden: economists call it increasing the productive capacity of our economy. i called it building a better america. my plan to fight inflation will lower your costs and lower the deficit. 17 nobel laureates in economics said my plan will ease long-term inflationary pressures. top business leaders, and i believe most americans, support the plan. and here's the plan. first, cut the cost of prescription drugs. we pay more for the same drug produced by the same company in america than any other country in the world just look at insulin. one in 10 americans has diabetes. in virginia, i met a 13-year-old boy, the handsome young man standing up there, joshua davis. he and his dad both have type one diabetes. which means they need insulin every single day. insulin costs about $10 a vial to make. that's what it costs the pharmaceutical company. but drug companies charge families like joshua and his dad up to 30 times that amount. i spoke with josh and his mom. imagine what it's like to look at your child needs insulin to stay healthy, and have no idea how in gods name they're going to be able to pay for. what it does to your family, what it does to your dignity. their ability to look that child in the eye, to be the parent you expect yourself to be. i really mean it, think about that. that's what i think about. you know, joshua is here tonight, but yesterday was his birthday. happy birthday, buddy. for joshua and 200 thousand other young people with type one diabetes, let's cap cost of insulin at $35 a month, so everyone can afford it. and drug companies will do very, very well, their profit margin. while we're at it, i know we have great disagreements on this for with it, let's let medicare negotiate the price of prescription drugs. they already set the price for many drugs. the american rescue act is helping millions of families to save them on their health care agreements. let's close the coverage gap and make the savings permanent. second, let's cut energy costs for families. an average of $500 a year by combating climate change. let's provide the investment tax credits to weatherize your home and your business, to be energy efficient, and get a tax credit for it. clean energy production and solar, wind, and so much more. lower the price of electric vehicles, saving another $80 a month that you are not going to have to pay at the pump. the third thing we can do to change the standard of living for hard-working folks is cut the cost of childcare. cut the cost of childcare. folks, if you live in a major city in america, you pay up to $14,000 a year per child. i was a single dad for five years, raising two kids. i have a lot of help, though. i had a mom and dad, brother and a sister that really helped. but working-class folks shouldn't have to pay 70% of their income for child care. my plan would cut the cost of childcare for half of those families. and help parents, including millions of women who left the workforce during the pandemic because they couldn't afford childcare, to be able to get back to work. generating economic growth. my plan doesn't stop there. it also includes home and long-term care, more formal housing, pre-k for three and four-year-olds. all these will lower costs to families. under my plan, nobody -- let me say this again, nobody earning less than 400,000 dollars a year will pay an additional penny in new taxes. not a single penny. i may be wrong, but my guess is if we took a secret ballot in this floor, that we would all agree that the present tax system ain't fair. we have to fix it. i'm not looking to punish anybody. let's make corporations and wealthy americans start paying their fair share. look, last year -- last year, like chris coons and top carper and my distinguished congresswoman, we come from the land of corporate america. there are more corporations incorporated in america than every other state combined, and i still won 36 years in a row. the point is, they understand they shod pay just their fair share. last year, 55 of the fortune 500 companies earned $40 billion in profit and paid zero in federal taxes. now look, it's not fair. that's why i proposed a 15% minimum tax rate for corporations. and that's why in the g7 and other meetings overseas, i was able to be somewhat helpful, 130 countries agreed on a tax rate so companies can't get out of paying their taxes at home by shipping jobs in factories overseas and raising billions of dollars. that's why propose closing loopholes for the very wealthy to pay a lower tax rate than a teacher and a firefighter. so that's my plan, in more detail later. we will grow the economy, lower the cost to families. so what are we waiting for? let's get this done. we all know we've got to make changes. folks, while you are at it, confirm my nominees for the federal reserve. this plays a critical role in fighting inflation. my plan will not only lower costs and give famies a fair shot, it will lower the deficit. the previous administration not only raise the deficit for corporations, it undermined the watchdogs. remember, we had those debates about whether or not those watchdogs should be able to see every day how much money was being spent and wasn't going to the right place. under my administration, the watchdogs are back. and we are going to go after the criminals who stole billions of relief money meant for small business and millions of americans. tonight him announcing that the justice department will soon name achieved prosecutor for pandemic fraud. -- a chief prosecutor for pandemic fraud. thank you. by the end of this year, the deficit will be down to less than half of what it was before i took office. the only president ever to cut the deficit more than $1 trillion in a single year. lowering your costs also mattered, demanding more competition. i'm a capitalist. capitalism without competition is not capitalism. capitalism without competition is exploitation. it drives up prots. corporations have to compete. their profits go up and your prices go up when they don't have to compete. small businesses and ranchers and farmers, and i need not tell some of my republican friends, guess what, we've got four basic meatpacking facilities. that's it. you play with them, or you don't get to lay at all, and you pay a helluva lot more because there's only four. you see what's happening with ocean carriers, moving goods in and out of america. during the pandemic, about half a dozen less foreign-owned companies raise prices by as much as 1000%. and made record profits. tonight, i'm announcing a crackdown on those companies overcharging american businesses and consumers. as wall street firms take over more nursing homes, the quality of those homes has gone down. costs have gone up. medicare is going to set higher standards for nursing homes and makes your loved ones get the care they deserve and that they expect and they'll be looked at closely. we will also cut cost to keep the economy going strong and give workers a fair shot, provide more training and apprenticeships, hire based on skills, not just degrees. let's pass the paycheck fairness act. raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. and extend the child tax credit so no one has to raise a family in poverty. let's increase pell grant and increase our historic support for hs -- for hbcus. our first lady who teaches full-time calls america's best secret, community colleges. look, let's past the pro act, when a majority of workers want to form a union, they shouldn't be able to be stopped. when we invest in our workers and we build an economy from the bottom up in middle out, together we can do something we haven't done in a long time, build a better america. for more than two years, covid has impacted every decision in our lives and the life of this nation. and i know you are tired, frustrated, and exhausted. that doesn't even count close to a million people who sit at a dining room table or kitchen table and look at an empty chair because they lost somebody. i also know this. because of the progress we've made, because of your resilience , and the tools that we have been provided by this congress, tonight i can say we are moving forward safely, back to a more normal routine. we've reached a new moment in the fight against covid-19, where severe cases are down to a level not seen since july of last year. just a few days ago, the center for disease control and prevention issued a new mask guidelines. under the new guidelines, most americans, and most of the country, can now go mask free. based on projections, more of the country will reach a point across the next couple of weeks. thanks to the progress we've made in the pasture, covid-19 no longer need control our lives. i know some are talking about living with covid-19. tonight, i say that we never will just accept living with covid-19. we will continue to combat the virus as we do other diseases. because this virus mutates and spreads, we have to stay on guard. here are four commonsense steps as we move forward safely, in my view. first, stay protected vaccines and treatments. we know how incredibly effective vaccines are. if you are vaccinated and boosted, you have the highest degree of protection. we will never give up on vaccinating more americans. i know parents with kids under five are either just -- eager to see vaccines are thrust for their children. scientists are working hard to get that done and have plenty vaccines when they do. we are also ready with antiviral treatments. if you get covid-19, the pfizer pill were reduce your chances of ending up in the hospital by 90%. i've ordered more pills than anyone in the world has. pfizer has been working overtime to get us a million pills this month and more than double that next month. and now we are launching the test to treat initiative. so people can get tested at a pharmacy if they prove positive, receive the antiviral pills on the spot at no cost. folks, if you are immunocompromised or have some other vulnerability, we have treatments and free high-quality masks. we are leaving no one behind or ignoring no one's needs as we move forward. on testing, we've made hundreds of millions of tests available, and you can order them for free to your doorstep. we have already ordered free tests tonight, let me announce you can order another group of tests. go to covid test.gov, starting next week, and you can get more tests. second, we must prepare for new variants. over the past, we've gotten much better at detecting new variants. if necessary, we will be able to develop new vaccines within 100 days, instead of maybe months or years. we will have new stockpiles of tests, masks, pills, ready when needed. i can promise you we will do everything within our power to be ready if it comes. third, we can end the shut down on schools and businesses. we have the tools we need. it's time for america to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again with people working -- people working from home and begin to feel safe and return to their offices. we are doing that here in the federal government. the vast majority of federal workers once again work in person. our schools are open. let's keep it that way. our kids need to be in school. 75% of adult americans are fully vaccinated, and hospitalization is down by 77%. most americans and remove their masks and stay in the classroom and move forward safely. we achieved this because we provided free vaccines, treatments, tests, and masks. of course continuing this costs money, so i will soon send a request to congress. the vast majority of americans have used these tools and we might need them again, so i expectongress, i hope you will pass it quickly. of course we will continue vaccinating the world. we've sent 475 million vaccine doses to 112 countries, more than any nation on earth. we won't stop. you can't build a wall high enough to keep out a vaccine -- the vaccine can stop the spread of these diseases. we've lost so much with covid-19. time with one another. worst of all, much loss of life. but choose this moment to reset. stop looking at covid as a partisan dividing line. see it for what it is. a god awful disease. let's stop seeing each other as enemies and start seeing each other as who we are, fellow americans. we can change how divided we in. it was a long time in coming. we can change that and move forward. on covid-19 and other issues we faced together. i recently visited the new york city's -- city police department after an officer and his partner , they were root responding to a call of a man shot and killed with the stolen gun. both minnick and americans who grew up on the same streets that they later chose to patrol as police officers. i spoke with their families. i told them we are forever in debt for their sacrifices and will carry on their mission to restore trust and safety that every community deserves. like some of you who have been around for a while, i've worked with you on these issues for a long time. i know what works, investing in prime -- crime prevention, with officers who walk the beat and know the neighborhood and can restore trust and safety. let's come together and protect our communities, restore trust and hold law enforcement accountable. that's why the justice department is requiring body cameras, banning chokeholds and restrictinno-knock warrants for its officers. that's why the american rescue plan that you all have provided $350 billion to cities, states, and counties can use to hire more police and invest in more proven strategies. proven strategies like community violence interruption, trusted messengers, breaking the cycle of violence and trauma, giving young people some hope. we should all agree the answer is not to defined the police. it's too fund the police. fund them. fund them with resources and training, resources and training they need to protect our communities. i asked democrats and republicans alike to pass my budget and keep our neighborhoods safe. we will -- i will do everything my power to crack down on gun trafficking of ghost guns. you can buy online and assemble at home, no serial numbers, can't be traced. i asked congress to pass proven measures to reduce gun violence. pass universal background checks. why should anyone on the terrorist list be able to purchase a weapon? why? folks, ban assault weapons with high-capacity magazines that hold 100 rounds. you think the deer are wearing kevlar vests? gun manufacturers are the only industry in america that can't we sued. the only one. imagine had we done that with tobacco manufacturers. these laws don't infringe on the second. they save lives. the most fundamental right in america is the right to vote and have it counted. and look, it'under assault. state after state, new laws have been passed, not only to suppress the vote, we've been there before, but to subvert the entire election. we can't let this happen. tonight i call on the senate to pass the freedom to vote act. past the john lewis voting rights act. and while you are at it, pass the disclose act so americans know who is funding our elections. tonight, i'd like to honor someone who dedicated his life to serving his country. justice breyer, an army veteran, constitutional scholar, retiring justice of the united states supreme court. justice breyer, thank you for your service. thank you, thank you. stand up and let them see you. thank you. and we all know, no matter what your ideology, one of the most serious constitutional responsibilities a president has is nominating someone to serve on the united states supreme court. as i did four days ago, i nominated circuit court of appeals katanji brown jackson, one of the nation's top legal minds, we will continue justice breyer's legacy of excellence. former top litigator in private practice, a former federal public defender, from a family of public school educators in police officers. she is a consensus builder. since she has been nominated, she has received a broad range of support, including the fraternal order of police, and former judges reported by democrats and republicans. folks, to advance liberty and justice, we need to secure our border and fix the immigration system. as you might guess, i think we can do both. at our border, we've installed new technologies like cutting-edge scanners to better detect drug smuggling. we've set up point patrols in mexico and guatemala to catch more human traffickers. we are putting in place dedicated judges in significantly larger number so families fleeing persecution can have their cases heard faster and those -- supporting partners in south and central america. we can do all this while keeping lit the torch of liberty that has led a generation of immigrants to this land. my forebears and many of yours, providing a pathway to citizenship for dreamers. those with temporary status, farmworkers, essential workers. so businesses have workers they need and families don't wait decades to reunite. it's not only the right thing to do, it's the economically smart thing to do. that's why immigration reform is supported by everyone from labor unions to religious leaders to the u.s. chamber of commerce. let's get it done, once and for all. folks, advancing liberty and justice also requires protecting the rights of women. the constitutional right affirmed by roe v. wade, a standing precedent for half a century is under attack. we must protect access to health care. preserve a woman's ght to choose and continue to advance internal health care for all americs. and folks, for our lgbtq plus americans, let's finally the bipartisan equality act to my desk. the onslaught of state laws targeting transient or americans and their families is simply wrong. i said last year especially to our younger transgender americans, i will always have your back as president so you can be yourself and reach your god-given potential. folks, as i've just demonstrated, it often appears we do not agree, but we agree on a lot more things than we acknowledge. i signed 80 bipartisan bills into law last year, from preventing government shutdowns to detecting -- protecting asian americans, to reforming military injustice, and will soon be strengthening the act that i first wrote three decades ago. it's important for us to show the nation we can come together and do big things. tonight i'm offering a unity agenda for the nation. four big things we can d together. first, beat the opioid epidemic. there is so much we can do. increase funding for prevention, treatment, get rid of outdated rules and stop -- that stop doctors prescribing treatments. stop the flow of illicit drugs by working with state and local law enforcemento go after the traffickers. if you are sfering from addiction, you know you are not alone. i believe in recovery, and i celebrate the 23 million americans in recovery. second, let's take on mental health. especially among our children whose lives and education have been turned upside down. american rescue plan gave schools money to hire teachers and help students make up for lost learning. i urge every parent to make sure your school does just that. we have the money. we can all play a part. sign up to be a tutor or mentor. children were also struggling before the pandemic. bullying, violence, trauma, and the harms of social media. as francis, whos here tonight with us, has shown, we must hold social media platforms accountable for the national experiment they are conducting on our children for profit. folks, thank you. thank you for the courage you showed. it's time to strengthen privacy protections. band targeted advertising to children. demand tech company stopped collecting personal data on our children. let's get all americans the mental health services they need. more people can turn for help and full parity between physical and mental health care if we treat it that way in our insurance. the third piece of that agenda is support our veterans. veterans are the backbone and the spine of this country. they are the best of us. i've always believed that we have a sacred obligation to attacked those we send to war and care for their families when they come home. my administration provides assistance and job training and housing and now helping lower income veterans get health care. our troops in a wreck face many dangers. reading in toxic smoke from burn pits. many of you have been there. i've been to iraq and afghanistan over 40 times. these burn pits that incinerate the waste of war, medical and hazardous material, jet fuel, and so much more. and they come home, many of the world's fittest and best trained warriors in the world, never the same. headaches, numbness, dizziness. a cancer that will put them in a flag draped coffin. i know. one of those soldiers was my son . i don't know for sure if the burn pit he lived near in a rack and earlier than that, kosovo, was the cause of his reign cancer and the disease of so many other troops, but i am committed, committed to military families like danielle robinson from ohio, the widow of sergeant first class heath robinson. he was born a soldier, army national guard, combat medic in kosovo and iraq, stationed near baghdad, just yards from burn pits the size of football fields. daniel is here with us tonight. i love going to ohio state football games. he loved building legos with their daughter. but cancer in the long exposure to the burn pits ravaged his lungs and body. danielle said he was a fighter to the very end and didn't know how to stop fighting. through your pain she found purpose to demand we do better. tonight, we are going to do better. the v.a. is finding new ways of fighting toxic disease, already helping more veterans get benefits. am the expding veteran -- benefits to veterans suffering from nine cancers i'm calling on congress to make sure veterans exposed to toxic exposure finally get the comps of -- comprehensive benefits they need. the fourth and last, let's end cancer as we know it. this is personal. this is personal to me and to jill and to kamala and so many of you who have lost someone you love. husband, wife, son, daughter, mom, dad. cancer is the biggest killer second only to heart disease. our goal is to cut cancer death rates by at least 50% over the next 25 years or maybe even better than that. turn cancers from death sentences into treatable diseases. or support for patients and their families. to get there, i call on congress to fund what i call arpa-h, advanced research projects agency for health. patterned after darpa in the defense department. projects that led to the internet, gps and so much more to make our forces safer and be able to wage war with more clarity. arpa will have a single purpose, to drive breakthroughs in cancer, alzheimer's and diabetes, and more. with the unity agenda for america, we can do things. it's within our power and i don't see a partisan edge to any of those four things. i fellow americans, tonight we've gathered in this sacred space, the citadel of democracy, in this capitol, generations have debated great questions through great strife and have done great things. we fought for freedom, expanded liberty, debated totalitarianism and terror. with both the strongest, freest, and most prosperous nation the world has ever known, now is the hour. our moment of responsibility, our test of resolving conscience, of history itself, it is in this moment that are character of this generation is formed. our purpose is found. our future is forged. well, i know this nation. we will meet the test. protect freedom and liberty. expand fairness and opportunity, and we will save democracy. as hard as those times have been, i'm more optimistic about america today than i've been my whole life, because i see the future that is within our grasp. because i know there's simply nothing yonder capacity. we are the only nation on earth who has always turned every crisis we face into an opportunity. the only nation that can be defined by a single word, possibilities. so on this night, on our 245th year as a nation, i've come to report on the state of the nation, the state of the union, and my report is this. the state of the union is strong because you, the american people, are strong. we are stronger today than we were a year ago. and we will be stronger a year from now then we are today. this is our moment to meet and overcome the challenges of our time, and we will, as one people, one america, the united states of america. i bless you all, and may god protect our troops -- god bless you all and may god protect our troops. thank you. go get him. judy: president biden thanking vice president -- house speaker nancy pelosi, after one hour in two-minute state of the union address, starting out on ukraine, rlying americans to support ukrainian people who are right now struggling to survive against the russian onslaught. the president moving on after 15-20 minutes of talking about ukraine, moving on to talk about the challenges of his administration, domestic, health care, voting rights, the strength of the country, and then as you hear in the last few minutes, -- the last few moments of the speech, coming back to democracy, and calling on the nation to come together. saying this is our moment of responsibility, our test of resolving conience, of history itself. he said it is in this moment that our character is formed, the character of this generation and how our future is forged. the president making the point to appeal to unity at a time when the country is so clearly divided politically. as we watch president biden leave the house chamber, greeting house members, senate members, greeting members of the senate. we saw democrats cering more than we did republicans, but we saw people across both sides of the house chamber cheering. we have correspondents joining us as we watch president biden lee. we also have our analyst from the washington post and atlantic magazine. jonathan capehart, i want to come to you. i was struck that the president used ukraine in the beginning to bring the country together, and then as he wrapped up the speech again, appealed for unity and appealed for americans to work across our political divide. jonathan: the word that connects those two, the beginning and the end, is democracy. the focus on ukraine was the focus of people who have a democratically elected government that is now under siege by a country run by dictator. the fact that the president spent the first 12 minutes, and i was keeping tabs, the first 12 minutes of his speech talking about ukraine, lauding the spirit and the courage of the ukrainian people, while at the same time, earning bipartisan standing ovations from them accredits and republicans for the words he was saying and the support he was giving to the ukrainian people. and then at the end of the speech, throughout the campaign, judy, the one time i always saw candidate joeen and president joe biden get animated , passionate, fiery, is when he is talking about the american people and american democracy and what we can do and what we can achieve when we are united as a people. when you look at those two bookends of the speech, what we heard is a presidentho is committed in his bones to democracy at home and abroad. judy: and that theme of unity we've just been talking about ran through the speech. i just want to say we are wahing president biden linger, i think perhaps longer than other presidents have, leaving the chamber. this is someone who spent 36 years in the united states senate. he paid tribute to justice stephen breyer, who you can s standing there to speak with him before he leaves the chamber. this is someone who is familiar with this body, with the senate, with the house, having served in the senate. i think you see the warmt of the friendship between the president and justice breyer, who himself worked in the united states senate. he was a le
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