Battling Dress Codes at the State of the Union

It’s on.

Such was the gist of President Biden’s State of the Union address; such was the message of the women of the Democratic caucus sitting in the House chamber wearing white en masse; such, even, was the statement contained in the Laken Riley pins and T-shirts of some Republicans. Even if Mr. Biden was the only one officially talking, it was impossible not to see — and thus hear — them all.

The State of the Union has increasingly become a stage for sartorial statement-making, but rarely have the causes embedded in the clothes been this contested. Nor has the fact that the coming election will be fought through every means possible, including imagery, been this clear.

It began in 2017, when the Democratic women adopted the white suits of the suffragists — a choice Hillary Clinton popularized during her campaign for the presidency — at President Donald J. Trump’s first address to a joint session of Congress, as a sign of the importance of women’s rights.

The next year white was replaced by black in support of the #MeToo movement, while the members of the Congressional Black Caucus wore kente cloth draped around their necks in opposition to President Trump’s statements about Africa and Haiti. White returned even more emphatically in 2019 and 2020. In 2022, many members, as well as the first lady, Jill Biden, used their dress to signal solidarity with Ukraine.

Still, even in the context of what has come before — perhaps because of the context of what has come before — the women in white were striking. They stood out in a block amid a sea of dark suits like a beacon of solidarity.

At this stage, the symbolism of the white suit is practically a cliché, broadly understood. It has been adopted during major public occasions by any number of women wanting to make a point about female strength and the fight for its future.

Representative Nancy Pelosi wore a white pantsuit when she announced that the House would begin drafting articles of impeachment against Mr. Trump. Kamala Harris wore white in her first speech as vice president-elect. Not only did Liz Cheney wear white for her final speech during the House’s televised Jan. 6 hearings, but Cassidy Hutchinson, President Trump’s former aide, and Sarah Matthews, a former deputy White House press secretary, were also in white when they testified in those hearings.

This time the suits were not just about suffragists and women’s rights in general, but, as the pins they wore on their lapels declared, the message was also “Fighting for Reproductive Freedom.”

“Our message is clear: Women must be able to access the health care they need to control their own lives and futures,” Representative Lois Frankel, the chair of the Democratic Women’s Caucus said of the pins in a news release.

Representative Robin Kelly, Democrat of Illinois, posted a photo of the caucus members posed on a staircase in the House and wrote, “We will never stop advocating for women, from reproductive rights to workplace equality.” So did Representative Brittany Pettersen, Democrat of Colorado.

The sheer size of the group was a statement in itself. As was the fact that Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who made a name for herself last year with her heckling of President Biden, took a page from their playbook by donning a bright red MAGA hat and matching red jacket to symbolically align herself with Mr. Trump’s campaign. She paired it with a “Say Her Name” T-shirt featuring a picture of Laken Riley, the nursing student killed by a person the authorities have said is a Venezuelan migrant, in a nod to Mr. Trump’s immigration rhetoric. (The slogan is an appropriation of the Black Lives Matter chant.)

Ms. Taylor Greene also wore a button with Ms. Riley’s photo on it, an accessory she handed to President Biden. Representative Matt Gaetz also wore a Riley pin; so did former Representative George Santos, though Mr. Santos’s rhinestone shirt collar made his choice of attire seem more about attracting attention to himself than to any specific policy. Representative Troy Nehls of Texas even wore a star-spangled bow tie and a T-shirt featuring Mr. Trump’s mug shot and the line “Never surrender.”

Still, in the end, the pins, shirts and cap did not have quite the effect of the white suits. They did not echo through the screens on which most viewers consume imagery.

But they were nevertheless a tell. The weapons of influence and the uniforms of allegiance can take many forms. What we see, whether we register it consciously or not, worms its way into our brains and shapes how we think. Mr. Trump has always been a candidate who understands as well as anyone how to use costume and visuals — even his own mug shot — to his own ends. That strategy now permeates politics on all sides. Get ready. This is only the beginning.