Just days after surviving an assassination attempt, Donald Trump officially accepted his party’s nomination for the November presidential election on Thursday evening, at the end of the Republican National Convention, which has been taking place since Monday in Milwaukee.
Before a crowd of ecstatic supporters and delegates who came from every state in the country to celebrate the moment, the former president presented himself as a survivor “protected by God” but also as a fighter, assuring his followers that “nothing will stop us.” “I will never stop fighting for you and for our great country,” he said after accepting “proudly, with faith and devotion” the “nomination as candidate for President of the United States.”
Despite his many well-documented attempts to reverse the results of the 2020 vote and his contribution to the insurrection of his troops against the seat of the American legislative branch on January 6, 2021, the populist has also posed as a “savior of democracy for the people”, calling on the Democratic Party to “immediately stop politicizing the judicial system and labeling their political opponent as an enemy of democracy”. “Especially since it is not true,” he insisted.
“This is a great day,” said South Carolina delegate Julie Baker, as a woman behind her waved a sign calling for “bringing sanity” to Washington. “Tonight marks the start of the presidential race we’ve waited four years to get Donald Trump back in the White House. He needs to be president again to save our country.”
The President of “All America”
Dropping his vindictive tone at times, the former president opened his speech with a call for unity, saying he was running “for president of all of America, not half of America.” “We are one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all,” he said. “And we must not criminalize dissent, nor demonize political disagreement, which is prevalent in our country today at a level that no one has ever seen before.”
In the following minutes, however, he again attacked Nancy Pelosi, the former Democratic leader in Congress, calling her, as usual, “crazy” and accusing Democrats of “destroying the country.”
“In November, I predict a landslide victory,” said Bruce Houseman, who came to represent Texas voters at the convention. “And you’re not only going to see strong support in the popular vote, but in Congress. And we’re going to take back California and even New York.”
“A normal life is what we want,” said Nirmal Paul, a delegate from New York met earlier in the day, while complaining about the high cost of filling up his Jaguar since the Democrats took office. “Everything is expensive now. We need someone a little more serious in Washington.”
“He’s going to be better than the first time,” said Rhonda Billingsley, a South Carolina activist. “We’re going to have a Trump 2.0 who’s going to bring peace and unity to this country.”
Program for the presidential election
The coronation of Donald Trump concludes four days of a great Republican mass that has maintained the cult of the populist’s personality, but also radiated the broad outlines of his political project, amplified by the many speakers who have taken to the stage since Monday.
In the Wisconsin metropolis, thousands of Donald Trump supporters were immersed in speeches, many of which called for closing the borders to secure the country by fighting against a “migrant invasion” bringing in, according to the former president’s followers, “murderers, rapists, human traffickers, drug cartel members, spies and terrorists.” A theme taken up by Donald Trump in his speech, which once again accused immigrants of “stealing” American jobs.
On Monday, Republican delegates adopted the party’s presidential platform, a document just 16 pages long that promises, among other things, to carry out the “largest deportation operation” of undocumented immigrants in the country’s history.
Crime has been falling since 2022, according to the latest FBI data, and is now at its lowest level in nearly 50 years.
In a video broadcast every night, Donald Trump also reiterated his attacks on the American electoral system and his unfounded claims of fraud that cost him the presidency in 2020. He also urged the crowd gathered at the Fiserv Forum to “keep your eyes open, because these people (Democrats) want to cheat and they cheat. And frankly, that’s the only thing they do right,” he said. “We’re going to protect the vote.”
Kremlin delighted with Vance’s choice as running mate
On Wednesday night, Donald Trump’s running mate, junior Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, made his official entrance as vice presidential candidate by flaunting his working-class roots in Appalachia, a region where Democrats and Republicans have been keen to court votes for years. He also blamed Joe Biden for the current global wars and geopolitical instability, while echoing Trump’s rhetoric about the foreign policy he promises to implement. “We will ensure that our allies share the burden of securing world peace,” he said. “No more handouts to nations that betray the generosity of the American taxpayer.”
The choice of JD Vance as running mate for this Republican campaign was warmly applauded Wednesday by activists gathered at the convention, but also by the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, who, from New York where he attended a meeting of the UN Security Council on Wednesday, praised this politician who is “in favor of peace and in favor of the end of the military assistance” provided by the United States and its allies to Ukraine. The country has been facing ongoing Russian aggression for more than two years.
“We can only welcome this (appointment), this is what we need to stop supplying weapons to Ukraine. This way the war will end and we will be able to look for solutions,” said the Kremlin’s foreign minister.
The hold that Donald Trump and his Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement have on the Republican Party was confirmed all week by the absence of more moderate politicians and party establishment figures at this convention, but also by the constant promotion of Trump’s obsessions that fuel the alternative realities into which the man has brought America.
“On fiscal issues, it’s clear that the party has now adopted a platform of economic populism that promises a lot but says nothing about reducing the national debt, slowing spending and addressing concerns about the size of the deficit, issues that have traditionally been core issues for Republicans,” Kathleen Dolan, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Wisconsin, said in an interview.
On Thursday night, Donald Trump promised that he would “bring prices down, and bring them down very, very quickly.” “By reducing energy costs, we will reduce the cost of transportation, manufacturing, and all consumer products. It all starts with energy. And remember, we have more oil under our feet than any other country,” he added.
The Republican campaign will continue Saturday with a rally by Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the first to be held in the wake of the convention since the attempted assassination of the former president in Pennsylvania less than a week ago.
This report was financed with the support of the Transat International Journalism Fund- The duty.
