Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) pulled an all-nighter and has delivered a record-breaking speech on the Senate floor looking to combat the Trump administration and its policies.
He broke the record for the longest speech on Tuesday evening, surpassing the previous record of 24 hours and 18 minutes by speaking for 25 hours and 5 minutes.
Booker, a Democratic leader, rose to speak at about 7 p.m. EDT Monday.
“These are not normal times in our nation,” he said. “And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate.”
Despite the length of Booker’s remarks, it is not considered a filibuster, though it did disrupt Senate business since it ran past 12 p.m., when the upper chamber was set to gavel in.
Where does Booker’s speech line up against history?
1) Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) – 2025
At 24 hours and 30 minutes and counting, Booker has delivered the longest floor speech in Senate history.
He had to remain on the floor until 7:19 p.m. EDT Tuesday to break the previously held record.
So far, he’s spoken at length about what Democrats say are threats from the GOP to cut Medicaid and Social Security.
Booker’s Democratic colleagues have come to the floor and ask questions. He asked a staffer to take away his chair so he wouldn’t be tempted to sit down.
At times, he’s read letters from constituents affected by the Trump administration’s cuts since taking office.
Booker said he was going to speak with “the intention of disrupting the normal business” of the Senate “for as long as I am physically able.”
While nearing the previous record, held by Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.), who was debating the Civil Rights Act, Booker noted that he was there speaking in the chamber despite Thurmond’s efforts to maintain segregation in the U.S.
“To hate him is wrong, and maybe my ego got too caught up that if I stood here, maybe, maybe, just maybe, I could break this record of the man who tried to stop the rights upon which I stand,” Booker said.
“I’m not here though because of his speech. I’m here despite his speech,” he continued. “I’m here because as powerful as he was, the people were more powerful.”
2) Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.) -1957
Thurmond’s 1957 civil rights debate on the Senate floor previously held the record for longest speech at 24 hours and 18 minutes long.
He began speaking on the civil rights debate at 8:54 p.m. and spoke until 9:12 p.m. the following day.
Thurmond broke the previously held record Sen. Wayne Morse set just four years prior.
3) Sen. Alfonse D’Amato (R-N.Y.) – 1986
D’Amato has the second-longest filibuster speech, from 1986. He was speaking about the Defense Authorization Act and spoke for 23 hours and 30 minutes.
4) Wayne Morse (I-Ore.) – 1953
Morse’s 22-hour, 26-minute speech about the 1953 Submerged Lands Act was the longest in history when he delivered it.
The five-term Oregon senator spent just a handful years of his life as an independent; he left the Republican Party a year prior to the speech and joined the Democrats two years after it, remaining a Democrat until his 1974 death at the age of 73.
5) Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) – 2013
Cruz spoke about the Continuing Appropriations Act in 2013. He held the floor for 21 hours and 18 minutes.
During the speech, Cruz argued about defunding the Affordable Care Act. His remarks turned playful when he read his daughters a bedtime story through C-SPAN, reading aloud the lines of Dr. Seuss’s “Green Eggs and Ham.”
Updated at 8 p.m. EDT
