President Joe Biden delivers his State of the Union speech to a joint session of Congress, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2023. (AP Photo / J. Scott Applewhite)

President Joe Biden checked those boxes, and a few more, during his speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday night. In part, he seemed to be laying the foundation to run for a second term. “We’ve been sent here to finish the job,” he said.

President Joe Biden delivers his first State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress at the Capitol, March 1, 2022, in Washington. (Jim Lo Scalzo / Pool via AP, File)

His speech before a politically divided Congress comes as the nation struggles to make sense of confounding cross-currents at home and abroad — economic uncertainty, a wearying war in Ukraine, growing tensions with China among them — and warily sizes up Biden’s fitness for a likely reelection bid.

Siegfried Hecker, from left, Daniel Holz, Sharon Squassoni, Mary Robinson and Elbegdorj Tsakhia with the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, remove a cloth covering the Doomsday Clock before a virtual news conference at the National Press Club in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2023. (AP Photo / Patrick Semansky)

“We are really closer to that doomsday,” former Mongolian president Elbegdorj Tsakhia said Tuesday at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists annual announcement rating how close humanity is from doing itself in.

Viking reenactors use flaming torches to write 2023 at the Flamborough Fire Festival, a Viking themed parade in aid of charities and local community groups, held on New Year's Eve in Flamborough near Bridlington, England, Saturday Dec. 31, 2022. (Danny Lawson/PA via AP)
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Across the world, at least for a day, thoughts focused on possibilities, even elusive ones like world peace, and mustering — finally — a resolve to keep the next array of resolutions.

(CNN)

U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Chicago, is co-chair of the Congressional Ukraine Caucus and was appointed to the escort committee for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s joint address to Congress.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks as he meets with President Joe Biden in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2022, in Washington. (AP Photo / Patrick Semansky)

In a brief remarks before reporters, President Joe Biden told Zelenskyy that “it’s an honor to be by your side” and he pledged continued financial, military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine. Biden also warned that Russia is “trying to use winter as a weapon” in the war.

Twin sisters Ellie and Natanya Sterling arrived in Highland Park after a journey that began in Ukraine. (Family Photo)

From Ukraine to Highland Park, twin sisters Ellie and Natanya Sterling have taken their parents on the ride of a lifetime.

People collect water from a Dnipro river in Kherson, Ukraine, Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2022. (AP Photo / Efrem Lukatsky)

Russia pounded Ukraine’s energy facilities Tuesday with its biggest barrage of missiles yet, striking targets across the country and causing widespread blackouts. A senior U.S. intelligence official said missiles crossed into NATO member Poland and killed two people.

Sen. Dick Durbin appears on “Chicago Tonight” on Oct. 17, 2022. (WTTW News)

As co-chair of the Senate’s Ukraine Caucus, Sen. Dick Durbin said any push to sit down at the negotiation table and offer Russia territory that it illegally took must come from the Ukrainians, not Western pressure.

An elderly man walks past a car shop that was destroyed after a Russian attack in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2022. (AP Photo / Leo Correa)

Air raid warnings sounded throughout the country for a second straight morning as Ukrainian officials advised residents to conserve energy and stock up on water. Strikes in the capital and 12 other regions Monday caused power outages and pierced the relative calm that had returned to Kyiv and many other cities far from the war’s front lines.

Kristina Kadashevych of the Kyiv City Ballet. (Courtesy of Kyiv City Ballet)

One day before Ukraine was invaded by Russia earlier this year, the company unknowingly boarded one of the last flights out of Kyiv to Paris, the first stop on a planned tour. The company has not returned home since then.

Cars queue to cross the border from Russia to Finland at the Vaalimaa border check point in Virolahti, Finland, Friday Sept. 23, 2022. (Sasu Makinen / Lehtikuva via AP)

The lines of cars were so long at the border with Kazakhstan that some people abandoned their vehicles and proceeded on foot — just as some Ukrainians did after Russia invaded their country on Feb. 24.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, center, reacts after his press conference in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Sept. 9, 2022. (AP Photo / Efrem Lukatsky)

The news came after days of apparent advances by Ukraine south of Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city, in what could become the biggest battlefield success for Ukrainian forces since they thwarted a Russian attempt to seize the capital of Kyiv.

Smoke rises from the nuclear power plant of Nerckarwestheim in Neckarwestheim, Germany, on Aug. 22, 2022. (AP Photo / Michael Probst, File)

Russia has choked off the supplies of cheap natural gas that the continent depended on for years to run factories, generate electricity and heat homes. That has pushed European governments into a desperate scramble for new supplies and for ways to blunt the impact as economic growth slows and household utility bills rise.

A man rides his bike past flames and smoke rising from a fire following a Russian attack in Kharkiv, Ukraine, March 25, 2022. (AP Photo / Felipe Dana, File)

Six months later, the largest military conflict in Europe since World War II has turned into a grinding war of attrition. The Russian offensive has largely bogged down as Ukrainian forces increasingly target key facilities far behind the front lines, including in Russia-occupied Crimea.

(WTTW News)

An art show near Ukrainian Village is a cry of protest against the ongoing war in Ukraine. Artists from Chicago and Ukraine are raising their voices in opposition to the Russian invasion.