Far-right pundit Ann Coulter was fact-checked following President Donald Trump's State of the Union address when she tied remarks Trump made during the speech to ancestry, claiming that "we can't have a second-, third-, or fourth-generation immigrant as president."
As he closed out a rambling speech after speaking for nearly two hours, Trump said American innovators, workers, and soldiers formed an “enduring legacy” that the world still looks to for leadership. He argued that ordinary Americans had long been “forgotten, betrayed, and cast aside,” but declared that “great betrayal is over.”
He suggested that when “God needs a nation to work his miracles,” the answer is America, a place where “no challenge” is too great and whose destiny is “written by the hand of Providence.” He then declared that a new “golden age of America” was already underway.
As he often likes to do, he promised the country’s future would be “bigger, better, brighter, bolder, and more glorious than ever before"—words that ring hollow amid the ongoing nationwide immigration crackdown that has torn families apart and the country's economic slowdown that the White House continues obfuscate when not casting it in glowing terms.
But Coulter sounded impressed and even inspired when she took to X to remark:
"That beautiful ending to Trump's SOTU address reminds me why we can't have a second-, third-, or fourth- generation immigrant as president. Love for our country has to be in your genes."
Her remark makes no sense considering Trump doesn't have a single American-born grandparent—a Community Note directly below her post notes the following:
"President Trump is a second generation immigrant through his Scottish-born mother and a third generation immigrant through his German-born paternal grandparents."
You can see her post and the Community Note below.
Trump is far from the only U.S. president with close immigrant roots.
Several commanders in chief share that background, including Barack Obama, whose father came from Kenya; Herbert Hoover, whose mother immigrated from Canada; Woodrow Wilson, born to a mother from England; Andrew Jackson, whose parents were both Irish-born; and James Buchanan, whose father emigrated from Ireland.
People gave Coulter a swift reality check.
Think before you tweet, Ann.
