U.S. President Donald Trump delivered a State of the Union address on Tuesday lasting 107 minutes, the longest such speech in the country's history to a joint session of Congress. In doing so, Trump broke the record he himself set last year, when during his first annual address to Congress, he spoke for 99 minutes, eight minutes less than today. The head of state himself had warned the day before that he would give a very long speech to Congress. During his speech, the Republican highlighted what he considers the great achievements of his Administration, such as the fight against drug trafficking or illegal immigration. He also stated that his Administration has achieved success in economic matters, controlling inflation or getting the price of a gallon of gasoline to fall below 2 dollars, in addition to imposing tariffs on imports from other countries, which he assured will in the future replace the "income tax." The president also took the opportunity to attack the Democrats, denouncing, for example, their rejection of the bill to require all voters in the U.S. to certify their nationality when casting their vote to combat irregularities that, he says, are widespread and cost him the 2020 presidential election. Trump also accused the Democrats of "cutting all funds for the Department of Homeland Security," the department in charge of immigration that has been partially shut down for 11 days due to the opposition's refusal to approve budget allocations. Their refusal responds to their demand to change protocols for immigration agents—from prohibiting them from wearing masks to requiring them to have judicial warrants to carry out raids—after two U.S. citizens from Minnesota died in operations to detain immigrants in January. The president's speech, whose popularity ratings are around 40%, is being followed with special interest this year as the country holds midterm elections in November in which the Republicans are playing to maintain their slim majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives.
