NYT reports on the two separate responses given to the SOTUS:
In the party’s official reply, which immediately followed President Obama’s speech, Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, chairman of the House Budget Committee, said the country faced “a crushing burden of debt.” He vowed that Republicans, after assuming control of the House this year, would honor their pledge to provide Americans “a better choice and a different vision.”
“Americans are skeptical of both political parties, and that skepticism is justified — especially when it comes to spending,” Mr. Ryan said, striking a conciliatory tone as he vowed to work with the president to find cuts. “So hold all of us accountable.”
But Mr. Ryan, who was designated by Speaker John A. Boehner to respond to the president, did not have the last word. Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, who founded the Tea Party Caucus last year, gave a response of her own in a message to the Tea Party Express, one of the movement’s largest groups of activists.
“For two years,” Ms. Bachmann said, “President Obama made promises, just like the ones we heard him make this evening, yet still we have high unemployment, devalued housing prices and the cost of gasoline is skyrocketing.”
