WASHINGTON — Freshman Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., will deliver Democrats’ response to President Donald Trump’s joint address to Congress next Tuesday.
The opposing party typically selects an up-and-coming politician to rebut high-profile presidential speeches before Congress. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., announced the decision on Thursday, with Schumer saying in a statement that Slotkin was “nothing short of a rising star in our party.”
“She will offer a bold vision of hope, unity, and a brighter future for everyone, not just the wealthy few at the top,” Schumer said in a statement.
Jeffries said in a statement that Slotkin would “communicate that Democrats are fighting to lower the cost of living and protect Social Security and Medicaid while Republicans cut taxes for their billionaire donors and Elon Musk.”
Slotkin won a competitive Michigan Senate seat in November, defeating Republican Mike Rogers by a fraction of a percentage point. But she outperformed former Vice President Kamala Harris, who garnered 48.3% of Michiganders’ votes compared to Trump’s 49.7%.
Her 2024 election win marked one of Democrats’ few high-profile victories that year, with Slotkin and two other Democrats from Trump states still managing to win Senate elections.
Slotkin said in a statement that she was “looking forward to speaking directly to the American people next week.”
“The public expects leaders to level with them on what’s actually happening in our country,” she said. “From our economic security to our national security, we’ve got to chart a way forward that actually improves people’s lives in the country we all love, and I’m looking forward to laying that out.”
Slotkin previously served in the House, winning a battleground seat in 2018, the midterm election during Trump’s first term in office. She launched a bid for the Senate in the last election after former Sen. Debbie Stabenow announced her retirement.
The Michigan senator has also worked at the CIA and the Department of Defense.
After outperforming Harris in November, Slotkin said that Democrats needed to focus on “kitchen-table issues” and behave like normal people.
“It’s not rocket science, but talking about those issues plainly, not from the faculty lounge, but from the assembly line, is, I think, a very important message,” Slotkin told reporters in mid-November.
“I personally think that identity politics needs to go the way of the dodo,” she said. “People need to be looked at as independent Americans, whatever group they’re from, whatever party they may be from.”
Years earlier, Slotkin was vocal in explaining why she supported impeaching Trump for the first time in 2019, over allegations that he attempted a quid pro quo for political favors from Ukraine.
“I want people to think about where we will be if it becomes normal to ask foreign governments to intervene in our political process,” Slotkin said at the time. “What if that becomes normal?”
Trump’s address before Congress next Tuesday is not branded as a State of the Union address, where presidents typically lay out accomplishments achieved while in office.
Schumer and Jeffries also announced on Thursday that Rep. Adriano Espaillat, D-N.Y., would deliver the party’s Spanish language response.
Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., delivered Republicans’ response to former President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address last year.
Sahil Kapur and Scott Wong contributed.
