This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

Joe Kennedy, a member of the Kennedy political dynasty, delivered the official Democratic response to Donald Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday, warning that the US president had ushered in an era of divisiveness and hatred.

Trump State of the Union address promised unity but emphasized discord Read more

“Many have spent the past year anxious, angry, afraid,” said Kennedy, 37, a third-term congressman from Massachusetts, who is the grandson of Robert “Bobby” Kennedy and great-nephew of former President John F Kennedy.

Kennedy spoke just after Trump pushed for unity and declared a “new American moment” in his first State of the Union speech. Making the response to Trump was a tall order for the fresh-faced congressman who despite his family pedigree is relatively unknown on the national stage.



Kennedy was nonetheless chosen by Democrats due to his progressive record and forward-looking demeanor at a time when many Americans feel the nation is at a crossroads. He said in his response to Trump, “We all feel the fault lines of a fractured country ... We hear the voices of Americans who feel forgotten and forsaken.”

Immediate reaction to his address on social media was partly, unkindly, preoccupied over how glistening his lips appeared, which on Wednesday he explained on ABC’s Good Morning America was ChapStick. “A little too much, apparently,” he joked.

Before his election to Congress in 2012, Kennedy worked as a district attorney in his home state of Massachusetts and also served a two-year stint in the Dominican Republic as part of the Peace Corps.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Kennedy explained on Wednesday that ChapStick was the reason his lips glistened. ‘A little too much, apparently,’ he joked. Photograph: AP

The latter earned him a fluency in Spanish, a skill Kennedy did not hesitate to tap into on Tuesday when addressing the fate of nearly 700,000 young, undocumented immigrants, known as Dreamers, who were brought to the US illegally as children.

Congress remains at a deadlock over how to resolve their status, after Trump moved in September to rescind legal protections granted to Dreamers under Barack Obama. Kennedy spoke directly to the young immigrants from his podium, first in Spanish before translating his message in English.

“You are a part of our story,” he said. “We will fight for you. We will not walk away.”

Kennedy delivered his remarks from a vocational school in Falls River, Massachusetts, a city he declared was “built by immigrants”.

Just before he took the stage, Trump had recorded the third-longest State of the Union in modern US history. But even as the president sought to strike a conciliatory tone, his speech was pilloried by immigration advocates and Democrats for nationalist undertones that associated immigrants with violence and crime.

Kennedy’s speech was designed to project a more inclusive vision of America, while decrying Trump’s administration for rolling back civil rights and paving the way for “Hatred and supremacy proudly marching in our streets”.

The full speech – Trump's State of the Union address Read more

The staging inevitably led to chatter over Kennedy’s prospects as a contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. But operatives within the Democratic party believe the young politician might first seek to represent Massachusetts in the US Senate, following in the footsteps of his legendary great-uncle, the late Senator Ted Kennedy.

Asked about his political ambitions last year, Kennedy alluded to a potential run for the Senate “somewhere down the road”.

Until his national debut on Tuesday, Kennedy had gravitated toward keeping a lower profile in Washington. He has rarely made headlines, barring a viral speech denouncing Republican efforts to repeal Obama’s healthcare law on the House floor last year, which racked up more than 3 million views.