President Donald Trump addresses a joint session of Congress at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, March 4. (AP photo — Ben Curtis)

President Donald Trump delivered his fifth address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, a speech that highlighted the political divisions between America’s leaders and outlined his plans for his second term.

Within minutes of his opening, when he claimed the American people had given him and the Republican party a “mandate” to govern with the November election, Democrats in the chamber rose to shout at him. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La, interrupted the president and demanded a return to order, and then directed the House Sergeant at Arms to remove one member, Rep. Al Green, D-Texas.

Trump’s speech was filled with applause lines, which his Republican allies in the chamber happily cooperated with, while the Democrats in the chamber did not rise to show approval for his message even once.

Trump, denouncing the legacy of his predecessor Joe Biden, said he’d ended “woke” policies like diversity, equity and inclusion, the Green New Deal and other Democratic priorities.

“Our country will be woke no longer,” he said.

He dedicated minutes of his speech to outlining the alleged savings identified by his Department of Government Efficiency, an executive agency headed by South African billionaire Elon Musk that’s been criticized for inflating its alleged savings in federal spending by multiple billions of dollars and has been overseeing a wide-scale gutting of the federal workforce, repeatedly firing employees illegally or accidentally.

Trump did not acknowledge any of those glaring issues with the federal agency; he rather listed an unverified list of dozens of federal programs that he said have been cut, like funding for LGBTQ people in the African country of Lesotho.

“A country nobody has ever heard of,” he said.

Trump outlined a plan to balance the federal budget, and said he would rely in part on a $5 million “gold card” meant to give rich foreigners instant U.S. citizenship.

He outlined a plan to make car payments tax deductible, for vehicles made in the U.S., and other plans to cut taxes like making tips tax-free.

He continued to support his tariff plans, despite the havoc they wreaked on the American economy on Tuesday as the first round of import taxes went into effect on Canada, Mexico and China. He also reiterated an idea he put forward on social media this week — an export tax for American farmers selling their products internationally.

“Tariffs are about making America rich again and great again” he said. “There may be some disturbance, but we’ll deal with it.”

He argued that the tariffs would bring more manufacturers to the U.S. to avoid the taxes, and said that Congress should repeal the “CHIPS and Science Act,” passed in 2022, that has laid out billions in federal subsidies to help build major microchip manufacturing facilities and related industries across the U.S., including near Syracuse and in Canton. The town of Clay, outside Syracuse, is meant to see a massive, four-unit manufacturing center owned by Mircon as a result of that bill, but Trump on Tuesday said he thought that Congress should repeal the bill, which he called “terrible.”

Trump also focused on the border.

He thanked West Carthage native Tom Homan, appointed to head up immigration and border issues in his administration, and took credit for the precipitous drop in attempted illegal crossings recorded at the southern border last week.

He reiterated his plan to deport all people in the U.S. without documentation, saying that violent criminals would be first on the list and some would be prosecuted and imprisoned in the U.S. rather than deported, to avoid them returning.

He asked Congress to send him more money to do that “without delay,” a demand that could be difficult to meet as the House and Senate race toward a federal government shutdown and lawmakers squabble over whether or not to include the money in a bill to extend the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, or in a separate measure.

Trump also referenced the death of New York State Trooper Jonathan Diller, who was killed while conducting a traffic stop in March last year. He said he has signed an executive order to require a mandatory federal death penalty for people charged with killing a police officer.

He also reiterated his suggestion that the U.S. could secure Greenland, the northern Atlantic island that’s an autonomous territory of Denmark.

“We’re going to get Greenland, one way or another,” he said.

Danish and Greenlandic lawmakers and residents have said they are not interested in negotiating a purchase of the island.

Trump has also suggested the U.S. should take control of Canada and Ukraine, in one way or another, to control their valuable resources. Those plans have largely not been backed up by real policy or negotiation, but have served to worry and irritate the countries involved.

Trump’s speech lasted more than an hour and 40 minutes. He closed with a promise.

“The golden age of American has only just begun, it will be like nothing that has ever been seen before,” he said.

Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, who is Trump’s nominee to be ambassador to the United Nations but who is still a sitting member of Congress for the time being, shared a brief statement just after the address ended.

“President Trump has delivered the most exceptional first month of an American presidency in history,” she said. “Promises made, promises kept. The American Golden Age is here.”