President Joe Biden was forceful, aggressive and focused during his State of the Union address on Thursday night, March 7, tackling everything from abortion rights and Obamacare to military aide for Ukraine. Biden never mentioned likely GOP presidential frontrunner Donald Trump by name during his speech, only referring to him as "my predecessor." Yet he made a strong case for rejecting MAGA policies in the November election.

Biden's SOTU was followed by a rebuttal from Sen. Katie Britt (R-Alabama). Democrats, not surprisingly, have been attacking Britt's speech as a weak response to a fiery, on-target address. But the criticism is not only coming from members of Biden's party.

The Daily Beast's Jake Lahut, in an article published the next morning, stresses that Britt's speech was so bad that even Republicans are slamming it.

"The freshman senator is considered a rising star in the party," Lahut explains. "But her speech’s intense tone — with an over-the-top dramatic cadence that was delivered in a kitchen — left political operatives and observers struggling to make sense of it. In particular, some Republicans watched the high-profile speech with a grimace."

Lahut notes that Britt has been mentioned a possible running mate for Trump but may have endangered that possibility because of her March 7 rebuttal.

A GOP "operative," interviewed on condition of anonymity, told the Beast, "Everyone's fucking losing it. It's one of our biggest disasters ever."

Another Republican insider told the Beast that Britt "lowered her stature" with the rebuttal. And former GOP strategist Tim Miller, a Never Trump conservative who is supporting Biden, slammed Britt's speech as "creepy."

Conservative Alyssa Farah Griffin, who served as White House communications director under Trump but endorsed former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in the 2024 GOP presidential primary, is criticizing Britt's speech as well — although not as intensely as others on the right.

On X, formerly Twitter, Griffin posted, "Senator Katie Britt is a very impressive person. She ran a hell of race in [Alabama],” a former Trump White House communications adviser and Nikki Haley supporter posted on X. “I do not understand the decision to put her in a KITCHEN for one of the most important speeches she’s ever given."

Reprinted with permission from Alternet