President delivers the longest State of the Union address in American history.

Hon. Tuesday night. Nine-twelve p.m. Eastern. The President of the United States, in the chamber of the United States House of Representatives, delivered the State of the Union Address. The official length, on the record, as timed by the public-record people whose job it is to time these things, was one hour, forty-seven minutes, and forty seconds.

That is the longest State of the Union address in American history. It surpassed the previous record, held by Bill Clinton in 2000, by twenty minutes. It also surpassed this same President’s own previous record set the prior year. He broke his own record. For length.

Hon. Forty-seven United States Presidents have delivered State of the Union addresses. Forty-five of them did it in under an hour and a half. The format is supposed to be a report on the state of the nation, delivered to the joint session, in the time it takes to make a roast. George Washington’s first one was eight hundred and thirty-three words. You could read it in six minutes.

The Vice President sat behind him, on camera, the entire one hour and forty-seven minutes. The Speaker of the House sat next to him, on camera, the entire one hour and forty-seven minutes. The President of the United States talked. He talked about the economy. He talked about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. He talked about the Semiquincentennial, which is the fancy word for the country turning two hundred and fifty. He requested, on the record, that Congress codify his healthcare framework. He talked about international hot spots. He talked, somehow, forever.

The Senator giving the Spanish-language rebuttal, Alex Padilla of California, had to wait. The Senator giving the English-language rebuttal had to wait. The cable hosts had to wait. The audience at home, on a Tuesday night, in February, with their laundry running, had to wait. The State of the Union is now the State of the Speech, and the speech is as long as the man behind it wants it to be, and the man behind it wanted it to be an hour and a half.

Twenty minutes longer than Clinton. Twenty minutes longer than the President’s own, a year prior. Twenty.

Buddy. Twenty minutes is long enough to boil pasta. It is long enough to drive across town. It is long enough, on a Tuesday night in February, to put a small child to bed. The President of the United States added twenty minutes to a speech the country had already endured by not editing it. That is the whole story. He did not edit it. He added twenty minutes.

You ever notice how the people who run on cutting government waste deliver the longest speeches.

Funny how that works.