| Good morning. President Bill Clinton delivered the longest State of the Union in history in 2000, speaking for nearly 89 minutes. Will President Biden break his record tonight? Send your thoughts and your tips to earlytips@washpost.com. Thanks for waking up with us. | | |  | At the White House | | Russian attacks escalate as residential areas, government building shelled |  Refugees fleeing conflict in Ukraine wait for transport at the Medyka border crossing in Poland, Monday, Feb. 28, 2022. (AP Photo/Visar Kryeziu) | | | Updates on Ukraine: Kharkiv remains under the control of Ukrainian government authorities, but the city is being "surrounded" by Russian troops, Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said Tuesday. "Military equipment and armored vehicles are coming from different directions," he told The Washington Post in a phone interview shortly after the main city government building was hit by a projectile, causing a massive explosion. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who signed a decree late Monday to temporarily life visa requirements for foreign volunteers who wish to enter Ukraine and fight against Russian forces, said the attack on civilian areas in Kharkiv amounted to a "war crime." Happening today: Finnish lawmakers will meet today to discuss a petition calling for a vote on NATO membership, a move that comes amid a dramatic shift in public sentiment. Finland shares a long border with Russia, and is a close NATO partner but not a member. Support for formally joining the military alliance has been low — until now. What we're reading about the war: | What foreign policy hands want to hear from Biden tonight |  Tamara Zakhariia, center, embraces Oksana Bokalo, right, as they gathered with others to show their support for Ukraine near the White House on Feb. 27, 2022, in Washington. (Matt McClain/The Washington Post) | | | When President Biden accepted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) invitation in January to deliver the State of the Union address this evening, the speech offered the opportunity to sell the infrastructure law and rally support for passing the rest of Biden's agenda. Nearly two months later, Biden's team has refashioned the speech to inveigh against Russia's invasion of Ukraine. And some longtime foreign policy hands have urged Biden to use the address to rally the American public and the free world in defense of democracy. "This will be the defining speech of his presidency," said Michael McFaul, who served as U.S. ambassador to Russia during the Obama administration. "And so he needs to think about it in those big stark terms." McFaul urged Biden to look to the speech that Secretary of State Antony Blinken — a former presidential speechwriter in Bill Clinton's administration — delivered in January in Berlin. Blinken warned that allowing Russia to subjugate Ukraine "would drag us all back to a much more dangerous and unstable time, when this continent and this city were divided in two, separated by no man's lands, patrolled by soldiers, with the threat of all-out war hanging over everyone's heads." "If I were President Biden, I would cut and paste from that speech and bring that speech to the American people," McFaul said. Heather Conley, the president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States and former deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, suggested Biden look back to the Cold War speeches of Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan. "It's not [about] invoking the Cold War," she said. "It's invoking the inspiration that the courage of the Ukrainian people is showing us." | | The audience for Biden's speech will include Ukrainians as well as Americans. | | "I think the Ukrainians will be listening very, very closely," said William Taylor, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a statement to The Early that he expected Biden to use the speech to demonstrate his administration's "commitment to the people of Ukraine." Other lawmakers urged Biden to make the case for another barrage of sanctions targeting the Russian economy, as Ukrainian officials have called on him to do. "They've hit hard," said Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, referring to the sanctions the U.S. and its allies have imposed. "It's set [Vladimir] Putin back on his heels. But we need to know that those hits are gonna keep on coming to try to prompt him to take an off-ramp here." The administration has avoided sanctioning Russian oil and gas exports in the same way it's gone after Russia's banks, and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told reporters on Monday that was a mistake. "We're failing to hit Putin where it hurts the most," he said. The speech will address challenges domestic as well as foreign, with Biden expected to discuss inflation, the pandemic, rising crime and infrastructure. "White House officials cautioned late Sunday that the speech was still in flux and noted that elements and even major themes sometimes get dropped from the final version," as our colleagues Annie Linskey and Tyler Pager report. But even domestic themes tie into the crisis in Ukraine, such as high gas prices exacerbated by the war. The American Petroleum Institute, which represents the oil and gas industry, plans to send a letter to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm today urging the administration to help "alleviate the growing energy crisis in Europe" by moving forward on some its policy priorities, such as quickly approving liquid natural gas export applications. "I think it's really important that he talk [in the State of the Union] about American energy leadership as really a buffer in times of crisis like this," Mike Sommers, the trade group's president and chief executive, said in an interview. | | Several foreign policy hands urged Biden not to get bogged down in specific policy proposals. "I don't think this is a policy speech," Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, told The Early. "Too many State of the Union speeches get loaded down by 86 policy recommendations. I think it would be much more powerful to be thematic and to teach." The lesson, according to Haass: The war in Ukraine is "not just about freedom but it's about order, which everything else depends on." Biden "has to remind people it doesn't just happen by itself, that it's worth sacrificing for," he said. David Axelrod, the longtime adviser to former president Barack Obama, warned weeks ago in a New York Times op-ed that circulated among Biden allies that the country was too traumatized by the pandemic for him to deliver an upbeat State of the Union. The outbreak of war in Europe, if nothing else, could make it easier for Biden to strike a somber tone. "I think he should essentially begin a process of preparing Americans for a demanding era," Haass said. | | |  | The campaign | | Texas primaries start today. Here's what we're watching: |  A man passes an early voting poll site on Feb. 14, in San Antonio. (Eric Gay/AP Photo, File) | | | Happening today: "Voters in Texas will usher in the midterm campaign season with primaries that will test just how far to the right the Republican Party will shift in a state where many in the GOP have already tightened their embrace of former president Donald Trump," AP News's Will Weissert and Paul J. Weber report. | - "Incumbent Republican Gov. Greg Abbott appears well positioned to secure his party's nomination for another term after Tuesday's voting. Starting the campaign with more than $50 million, he has built hard-line positions on guns, immigration and abortion."
- "The GOP primary for attorney general may be more competitive as incumbent Ken Paxton seeks a third term in office. He's facing several challengers, including Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush and Rep. Louie Gohmert, who are vowing to restore order to the office."
| - Another chance for Beto? The question former congressman Beto O'Rourke "faces this year is whether Texas voters – who will see him as a major candidate for the third time in five years – are willing to give him another chance after his two losses," CNN's Eric Bradner writes. "The challenge is made even more daunting by the reality that 2022 could see the toughest political environment O'Rourke has faced to date, as he takes on a well-funded opponent in a state where a lack of campaign contribution caps could make it impossible to keep up with Abbott in the money race."
- The Progressives strike back: Jessica Cisneros, a 28-year-old immigration lawyer from Laredo, Tex., "stands as a serious challenge to [nine-term Rep. Henry Cuellar], one of the last congressional Democrats to oppose abortion rights and a frequent critic of Biden's immigration policies," our colleague Mariana Alfaro reported last week. "The closely watched contest underscores the divide in the party and is a fresh test of whether left-leaning candidates, who have struggled in recent elections, can prevail over more moderate Democrats."
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