Katie Britt will give the Republican answer to Biden’s State of the Union

Republicans have chosen Senator Katie Britt of Alabama to deliver their response to President Biden’s State of the Union address on Thursday evening. a president almost 40 years older.

Ms. Britt was sworn in last year after being endorsed by former President Donald J. Trump, whom she endorsed in his 2024 campaign. She is the first elected female senator from Alabama and, at age 42, the youngest Republican woman elected to the Senate. She was born as Mr Biden, 81, was serving his second term there.

“The Republican Party is the party of hardworking parents and families, and I look forward to centering this critical perspective,” said Ms. Britt. said in a statement last week. “There is no doubt that President Biden’s failed presidency has left America increasingly weak and vulnerable. At this defining moment in our country’s history, it is time for the next generation to step up and preserve the American dream for our children and grandchildren.”

Speaker Mike Johnson, in announcing her selection, noted that Ms. Britt is the “only current Republican mother of school-age children serving in the Senate.”

Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and Minority Leader, said: “Senator Katie Britt is an unapologetic optimist, and as one of our nation’s youngest senators, she has wasted no time in becoming a leading voice in the fight to secure a stronger American future. leave years of Washington Democrats’ failures behind you.”

In electing her, Republicans saddled Ms. Britt with a tradition so difficult to pull off that it is seen as somewhat cursed: the opposing party’s on-camera rebuttal during the president’s annual prime-time address to the nation, filled with pomp, ceremony and standing ovations.