Two Speeches
4/30/202613 min
April 29, 2026
Trump and King Charles give very different speeches in Washington DC, Trump’s speech portrays the US as no longer a nation based on Enlightenment principles, Trump suggests that the Atlantic Charter was an affirmation of a shared gene pool between the US and the UK, In his speech to a joint session of Congress, King Charles describes the US as having been founded on the revolutionary idea of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, King Charles aligned these ideas with the ideals of English Common Law and the Magna Carta, He also calls for resolve to help the people of Ukraine fight off the Russians, King Charles urges the US to join the UK in rededicating themselves to service of their people and the peoples of the world. Trump seems to miss the point of King Charles’s speech.
Watch today's recording here: https://www.youtube.com/live/g9TUa1Rwd6U?si=T8_KKcHQZElhpnZ-
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Transcript preview
First 90 secondsMichael Moss· Host0:00
[upbeat music] Hello, this is Michael Moss. Heather Cox Richardson is unable to read the letter today, so I will be reading it in her place. April twenty-ninth, twenty twenty-six. I will have plenty to say about the Supreme Court's decision today in Calais versus Louisiana, but tonight I want to make sure that yesterday's speeches by President Donald J. Trump and King Charles III of the United Kingdom don't get lost in the tidal wave of news. They presented a very clear picture of what is at stake in the United States today. King Charles and Queen Camilla are in the United States on a state visit, and in his speech welcoming them to the White House yesterday, Trump redefined the United States from a nation based on the principles of the Enlightenment, as it has historically been understood, to one based in the white nationalist ideas of blood and soil. "Long before Americans had a nation or a constitution, we first had a culture, a character, and a creed," Trump said. For nearly two centuries before the Revolution, this land was settled and forged by men and women who bore in their souls the blood and noble spirit of the British. Here on a wild and untamed continent,