President Biden has accepted House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s invitation to deliver the State of the Union address on Feb. 7, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Friday.
“The president is grateful for and accepts Speaker McCarthy’s prompt invitation to address the peoples’ representatives in Congress,” she said in a statement. “He looks forward to speaking with Republicans, Democrats, and the country about how we can work together to continue building an economy that works from the bottom up and the middle out, keep boosting our competitiveness in the world, keep the American people safe, and bring the country together.”
McCarthy sent a formal invitation to the president on Friday. It will be Mr. Biden’s second State of the Union address. A president’s first speech to a joint session to Congress, soon after inauguration, is not officially a State of the Union address.
“The new year brings a new Congress, and with it, a responsibility to work towards an economy that is strong, a nation that is safe, a future that is built on freedom, and a government that is accountable,” McCarthy wrote in his invitation. “The American people sent us to Washington to deliver a new direction for the country, to find common ground, and to debate their priorities. In that spirit, it is my solemn obligation to invite you to speak before a Joint Session of Congress on Tuesday, February 7, 2023, so that you may fulfill your duty under the Constitution to report on the state of the union.”
The address comes after a lengthy House speaker election last week, as well as the announcement this week of a special counsel inquiry into documents marked classified that were found at Mr. Biden’s home and former office at a Washington think tank bearing his name.
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