Cory Booker: The Democratic senator who delivered a marathon 25-hour speech against Trump

He sure knows how to talk.

Around 7 pm on Monday, American senator Cory Booker took his place behind a lectern on the Senate floor and said that he intended to disrupt business as usual “for as long as I am physically able”.

And able Booker was… the senator from New Jersey finally ended his marathon speech at 8.05 pm on Tuesday, giving him the honour for the longest speech on record in the US chamber — a whopping 25 hours and four minutes, surpassing the previous record that was set back in 1957.

As Booker recoups — he appeared exhausted and sentimental — from his speech, we take a closer look at who he is and his filibuster.

Booker, a rising star of the Democratic Party

Fifty-five-year-old Cory Booker, born in Washington, DC, moved to New Jersey when he was just a boy. In the past, he has spoken about his growing up years — being a Black boy in a predominantly White community.

A graduate of Stanford University, he studied law at Yale and then began his career as a lawyer for non-profits. Later, he entered politics and was elected to serve on the city council of New Jersey’s biggest state, Newark, and then as mayor, a position he held until 2013.

In 2013, he was elected to the US Senate in a special election owing to the death of incumbent Frank Lautenberg. He then won his first full-term in 2014 and was re-elected in 2020.

In February 2019, Booker launched a bid for the US presidency from the steps of his home in Newark. However, that ended in failure when he dropped out as he struggled to raise money for his White House ambitions.

Incidentally, Booker is no stranger to making memorable moments. As a councilman in Newark, he moved into a tent in a parking lot outside a squalid housing project. The reason to show its deterioration and the city’s indifference.

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While in the Senate, Booker has played an instrumental role in passing bills. In 2019, he sponsored one that permitted states to transfer money from clean water revolving funds to drinking water revolving funds to address public health.

He also chairs the Democratic Strategic Communications Committee and according to his biography sought to protect the Affordable Care Act from repeal.

Booker’s record-making speech

On Monday, 55-year-old Booker took the podium at 7 pm ET on Monday on the Senate floor to criticise the Trump administration’s agenda and the work of Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency.”

“I rise tonight because I believe sincerely that our country is in crisis,” he began his speech. In the hours that followed, he presented his speech as a warning about the “grave and urgent” threat Americans faced from the Trump administration, arguing that “bedrock commitments” to the country “are being broken.”

“In just 71 days, the president of the United States has inflicted so much harm on Americans’ safety; financial stability; the core foundations of our democracy,” Booker said. “These are not normal times in America. And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate.”

During his lengthy remarks, he even invoked the spirit of the late John Lewis, a civil rights icon and longtime US congressman. “I start tonight thinking about him; I’ve been thinking about him a lot during these last 71 days. ‘Get in good trouble, necessary trouble, help redeem the soul of America’,” Booker said, invoking Lewis’ words. “And had to ask myself, if he’s my hero, how am I living up to his words?”

He added, “He (Lewis) wouldn’t treat this moral moment like it was normal,” asking, “Where does the Constitution live? On paper or in our hearts?”

But that wasn’t all. As he continued to hold the podium, Booker also read letters from constituents, who spoke of the hardships they were facing owing to US President Donald Trump’s policies. Moreover, he discussed sports, recited poetry and even took questions from colleagues.

But by the 22nd hour, Booker realised he was dimming. He said, “I don’t have much gas left in the tank.

“More Americans need to stand up and say enough is enough,” he said.

Crossing the 25-hour mark, Booker concluded his remarks with a reference to Lewis once again, saying, “Let’s be bolder in America, with a vision that inspires with hope.”

Booker ended his speech with tears in his eyes and placed his hand over his heart. Meanwhile, others were also seen crying and some rushed to hug the exhausted senator.

He later took to X and wrote that he was “tired and a little hoarse,” but that he believed “history will show we rose to meet this moment.”

I may be tired and a little hoarse, but as I said again and again on the Senate floor, this is a moment where we cannot afford to be silent, when we must speak up.

What’s most clear to me tonight is that this is just the beginning, that Americans across this country, no matter…

— Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) April 2, 2025

Booker’s prep for marathon speech

But how did Booker prepare for this moment? After all, it’s no joke to be standing at the lectern delivering a speech for over 25 hours.

Speaking to reporters, he said that he had stopped eating on Friday and then stopped drinking the night before. An NBC report also added that he had pain medicine in his desk drawer in case he needed it.

What shocked many reporters about Booker’s speech was that he didn’t take a bathroom break for the duration of his speech. When asked if he had a catheter or was wearing a diaper, Booker sidestepped the question.

Unlike any filibuster in the past

While many have referred to Booker’s speech as a filibuster, it’s not technically one. That’s because a filibuster is loosely defined as an action designed to prolong debate and delay or prevent a vote on a bill, resolution, amendment, or other debatable question.

Booker was doing none of that. Instead, his was a critique of Trump’s agenda and a rallying cry for the Democrats.

Booker also broke the filibuster record held by Republican Senator Strom Thurmond, who spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act in 1957. Booked acknowledged to MSNBC later that Thurmond’s record “always kind of just really irked me.”

“The longest speech on our great Senate floor was someone who was trying to stop people like me from being in the Senate. So to surpass that was something I didn’t know if we could do, but it was something that was really — once we got closer, became more and more important,” he said.

With inputs from agencies