New Jersey’s U.S. Sen. Cory Booker sets a record, makes a marathon speech objecting to several Trump administration policies

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New Jersey’s U.S. Sen. Cory Booker does not agree with several actions taken by President Donald Trump, and he’s speaking out about it.

A lot.

The Democratic senator took to the Senate floor at 7 p.m. Monday, objecting to cuts impacting Medicaid and Social Security, as well as protesting the Trump administration’s immigration policies and efforts by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency to reshape the size of the federal government.

Early on Booker had vowed to continue to talk as long as he was physically able to do so, and by the time he finished he had set a record for the longest continuous Senate floor speech in U.S. history.

How long is a senator allowed to speak?

According to the rules of the U.S. Senate, Booker was allowed to continue to speak for as long as he wanted, but he could not officially stop or take a break because that is considered yielding the floor, and the presiding officer of the Senate would then have been permitted to move on to other official business.

However, senators were permitted to ask Booker a “question,” and the “question” could take several minutes or longer, essentially allowing Booker to take a break. Although, while it gives him a break from speaking, he had to remain standing while others are talking.

What was the end game?

Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, said Booker’s primary goal was to mobilize people who oppose the president’s actions. But there’s another reason he delivered a marathon speech.

“We know that Trump pays a lot of attention to who’s on TV, pays a lot of attention to who’s in front of the camera. Booker is certainly getting attention here, he is certainly calling attention to this effort,” he said.

Ben Dworkin, director of the Rowan University Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship, said the Democratic Party has been accused of not speaking out against the president’s policies forcefully enough.

“Booker took the opportunity to command the spotlight, and he has been helped out by his Democratic colleagues when he has yielded for a question, they’ve spoken to echo the same themes,” he said.

He said it’s a dramatic gesture.

“We almost never talk about someone’s speech on the Senate floor, but this one we are,” he said.

It wasn’t a filibuster

Booker’s speech was technically not a filibuster because it is not holding up a vote on a bill or a nomination.

“This is not quite a filibuster, it certainly looks like a filibuster, it has the trappings of a filibuster, but they’re not in the middle of actual legislation right now, so it’s not a filibuster,” Rasmussen said.

“No other Senate business is going to get done while he and his colleagues continue to hold the floor. You need 60 votes to stop him from speaking, the Republicans don’t have those votes,” Dworkin said.

It is not clear whether Booker, who is a vegan and does not eat any animal products or refined sugar, did anything to prepare for his marathon speech. Calls to his office seeking comment were not immediately answered. In the past, Booker said a few weeks after giving up sweets, he started to have more energy and felt “phenomenal.”

What’s the longest speech in the Senate?

Booker’s speech lasted 25 hours and 5 minutes, which was the longest speech ever made on the floor of the Senate. The late Strom Thurmond of South Carolina made the second longest speech on the Senate floor. In 1957, he spoke for a total of 24 hours and 18 minutes, without interruption, opposing the Civil Rights Act.