Biden’s loquaciousness is well-documented. In January, he plowed past the longest-lasting press conferences by his predecessors with a 1 hour and 51-minute prime-time event, compared to Donald Trump (1 hour and 26 minutes) and Barack Obama (1 hour and 27 minutes).
But Biden’s first State of the Union was the fourth-longest of the seven most recent presidents’ first speeches, according to C-SPAN. Trump spoke for more than 1 hour and 20 minutes in his first State of the Union in 2018.
And it was a few minutes shorter than his first joint address to Congress last year, which lasted 1 hour and 5 minutes, according to the American Presidency Project. That speech isn’t technically deemed a “State of the Union” address.
As many State of the Union speeches do, Biden’s address Tuesday touched on a wide range of topics, from Covid-19 to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to police reform. His prepared remarks totaled 6,476 words.