WASHINGTON – It’s been more than 20 hours.

Sen. Cory Booker has not sat down, or ever wandered far from his desk on the Senate floor, where he has been delivering a marathon speech railing against President Donald Trump and his administration’s sweeping policy changes.

Since he started speaking at 7 p.m. on Monday night, the senior senator from New Jersey has not eaten. He has periodically sipped from two glasses of water that sit on his desk near five three-ring binders and a box of tissues. And he has not left the chamber to go to the bathroom.

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“I’m going to go for as long as I am physically able to go,” Booker said in a video posted to X before taking to the floor.

He added, “I’ve been hearing from people all over my state and indeed all over the nation calling upon folks in Congress to do more. To do things that recognize the urgency, the crisis of the moment. So we all have a responsibility, I believe, to do something different. To cause, as John Lewis said, ‘good trouble.’ And that includes me.”

Booker can and has allowed other Democratic senators to give short speeches and ask questions to give him a rest from speaking. But he cannot leave the chamber – and as long as he doesn’t, no other senator can force him to stop.

A few hours in, Booker had a Senate page remove his chair to reduce the temptation to sit. By Tuesday afternoon, he was rocking back and forth in his black tennis shoes and leaning lightly on his desk in between monologues.

Booker’s speech is already the fifth-longest in recorded Senate history. If he speaks until 7:19 p.m. EDT, he will break the record for the longest known floor speech: Then-Sen. Strom Thurmond’s 1957 speech against the Civil Rights Act went 24 hours and 18 minutes.

Booker’s office says he did not begin speaking with an end time in mind.

But “we have plenty of material left,” said Booker spokesperson Jeff Giertz.

The speech comes as the Democratic base rages at their representatives in Congress for not doing enough to push back against the administration. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer has faced calls for primary challengers and protests outside his home for voting with Republicans to keep the government open, and constituents have yelled at Democratic members at town halls to be more forceful in speaking up against Trump.

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Over the course of Monday night and all day Tuesday, Booker lambasted Trump and his advisor, tech billionaire Elon Musk, who together have dramatically and swiftly reshaped the federal government and redefined the relationship between the three branches of government.

Booker read letters he has received from constituents, and spoke about health care, housing, Social Security and other benefit programs, free speech, the public education system, the cost of living, and the United States’ role on the world stage.

As he opened his speech Monday night, Booker said: “These are not normal times in our nation. And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate. “