As part of an extended drum-roll before the state of the union address on Tuesday, the White House has issued its highlights from a year of speeches by Donald Trump.
Accompanied by images of the stars and stripes, cheering crowds and displays of US military might, the Facebook entry included presidential quotes, such as:
All the nations of the world – friend or foe – will find that America is strong, America is proud, and America is free.
– Speech to Congress, March, 2017
To Air Force personnel at Joint Base Andrews in September 2017:
We are, and forever will be, a nation of pioneers and patriots, risk takers and renegades, aviators and astronauts. We crave adventure and achievement, exploration and enlightenment.
From a speech touting tax reform in Missouri in November, 2017:
We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to restore American prosperity and reclaim America’s great destiny.
However, for world leaders and the general public hearing or reading about Trump’s speeches across the globe, other moments may be etched more deeply in their minds.
January of 2017 inauguration speech in Washington:
Americans want great schools ... safe neighborhoods...good jobs...for too many of our citizens, a different reality exists ... rusted-out factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape ... crime and gangs and drugs ... This American carnage stops right here and stops right now. From this day forward ... it’s going to be America first.
A speech at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, the day after the inauguration, in front of the memorial to fallen agents:
Probably almost everybody in this room voted for me … is Donald Trump an intellectual? Trust me, I’m like a smart persona. Did everybody like the [inauguration] speech? I’ve been given good reviews. We had a massive field of people...
Addressing the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Maryland, February of 2017:
We are Americans and the future belongs to us ... we are fighting the fake news. It’s phony ... the enemy of the people ... and we’re going to do something about it.
April of 2017 in Atlanta, when Trump was the first president to address the National Rifle Association since Ronald Reagan in 1983.
You came through for me, and I am going to come through for you ... I want to thank each and every one of you, not only for your help electing true friends of the second amendment, but for everything you do to defend our flag and our freedom.
Trump’s scolding of Nato leaders at its new headquarters in Brussels in May of 2017 was most notable for his failure to restate America’s commitment to “article 5”, the members’ mutual defense obligation. He said:
Twenty-three of the 28 member nations are still not paying what they are supposed to be paying for their defense. This is not fair.
Trump’s first major European public speech, in Warsaw in July of 2017, had a far-right tone.
For family, for freedom, for country and for God ... The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive ... Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it?
Addressing the Boy Scouts annual jamboree in West Virginia in July of 2017:
I said, ‘Who the hell wants to speak about politics when I’m in front of the Boy Scouts?’ … Our stock market has picked up since the election, November 8. Was that a beautiful date? Do you remember that famous night on television ... where they said there is no path to victory for Donald Trump?
As National Football League players continue to kneel during the national anthem, to protest racial prejudice and police brutality, Trump raised the topic while stumping in Alabama.
Wouldn’t you love to see one of these NFL owners ... say: ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out. He’s fired’?
September, 2017. Trump nicknamed North Korean leader Kim Jong-un “Little Rocket Man”. At the United Nations, Trump said:
The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea. Rocket Man is on a suicide mission.
Addressing the March for Life anti-abortion demonstration in Washington, January 2018, live by video feed.
Roe v Wade has resulted in some of the most permissive abortion laws anywhere in the world … [on late-term elective abortions] it’s wrong, it has to change ... Americans are more and more pro-life.
