President Biden and his team plan to fan out after Thursday evening’s State of the Union address to amplify his message and sell his agenda with visits to key battleground states, the start of a month of campaign-style barnstorming now that the general election contest has begun in earnest.
Mr. Biden will head to Philadelphia on Friday and Atlanta on Saturday for campaign speeches, hitting two of the half-dozen swing states that he won in 2020 and is counting on to defeat former President Donald J. Trump again in November. Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to Arizona and Nevada, two other states in that same category.
The Cabinet will join in the effort as well, as the secretaries of the Treasury, interior, agriculture, labor, health and human services, education energy and veterans affairs as well as various agency directors hit the road. These senior officials will promote the administration’s accomplishments on everything from job creation to clean energy while talking about policy goals like protecting abortion rights.
“As with any State of the Union address, the president will seize on the energy and momentum to travel across the country and speak to voters about how his agenda is and will deliver for their communities,” said Kevin Munoz, a spokesman for the Biden-Harris campaign. Following Philadelphia and Atlanta, Mr. Biden will have “additional travel throughout the month — rallies, coalition events, campaign organizing events, retail stops, and more to come.”
The president’s team did not even wait for the speech to begin publicizing it. A row of television cameras from 10 local stations from around the country was set up on Thursday just in front of the West Wing. White House officials like Ben LaBolt, the White House communications director, and Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, could step from one to the other to make the administration’s case in a sort of Washington version of speed dating.
The White House also invited radio hosts, Hispanic broadcasters and digital media influencers and publishers to spend part of the day at the White House for interviews. Ms. Harris was slated to provide a briefing to digital news outlets and creators ahead of the speech.
