DONALD TRUMP RECOUNTED his assassination attempt and called for unity before laying out a sweeping populist agenda as he accepted the Republican nomination for US president on the final day of the party’s national convention in Milwaukee.
It came just five days after the assassination attempt on the 78-year-old while he spoke at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania.
The 20-year-old gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, was shot dead at the scene. One attendee was killed and two others were injured.
The attack has loomed large at the convention, with Republicans lining up to applaud the former president for his bravery.
As some Republicans sought to blame anti-Trump rhetoric from the Democrats for the attack, Trump had said he tore up a more aggressive version of his keynote address in favour of one he hopes will “unite our country.”
After taking to the stage to chants of ‘USA, USA’, and speaking in a more subdued tone, he reflected on the attempt on his life by saying: “I shouldn’t be here tonight.
“I stand before you in this arena only by the grace of almighty God. And watching the reports over the last few days, many people say it was a providential moment. Probably was.”
"I'm not supposed to be here tonight...I stand here before you in this arena only by the grace of almighty God."
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 19, 2024
Donald Trump gave an emotional recounting of his assassination attempt, and said he would never tell the story again "because it's actually too painful."
Watch his… pic.twitter.com/z049cQMMdC
The former US president asked for a moment of silence to honour firefighter Corey Comperatore, who was killed during the shooting in Pennsylvania. Before a hushed crowd, Trump kissed the firefighter’s helmet on the stage.
Trump’s address, the longest convention speech in modern history at just under 93 minutes, marked the climax and conclusion of a massive four-day Republican pep rally that drew thousands of conservative activists and elected officials to swing-state Wisconsin.
Sensing political opportunity in the wake of his near-death experience, the former president embraced a new tone he hopes will help generate even more momentum in an election that appears to be shifting in his favour.
“The discord and division in our society must be healed. We must heal it quickly. As Americans, we are bound together by a single fate and a shared destiny. We rise together. Or we fall apart,” Trump said, wearing a large white bandage on his right ear to cover the wound he sustained in the shooting.
“I am running to be president for all of America, not half of America, because there is no victory in winning for half of America.”
Despite calling for unity, Trump pivoted to attacks on the Biden administration, claiming it was “destroying the county”.
He again suggested Democrats had cheated during the 2020 election he lost – despite a raft of federal and state investigations proving there was no systemic fraud – and suggested “we must not criminalise dissent or demonise political disagreement,” even as he has long called for prosecutions of his opponents.
He outlined an agenda led by what he promised would be the largest deportation operation in US history.
He repeatedly accused people crossing the US-Mexico border illegally of staging an “invasion” and teased new tariffs on trade and an “America first” foreign policy.
Trump made sweeping promises to end inflation, “Republicans have a plan” to bring down energy prices “very, very rapidly” but gave no details except to say he would “drill, baby, drill” and “reduce your taxes.”
He did not mention abortion rights, an issue that has bedevilled Republicans ever since the US Supreme Court struck down a federally guaranteed right to abortion two years ago.
Trump nominated three of the six justices who overturned Roe v Wade and at his rallies often takes credit for the ruling being overturned, arguing states should have the right to institute their own abortion laws.
Nor did he mention the Capitol riots on 6 January 2021, in which supporters tried to stop the certification of his loss to Democrat Joe Biden. Trump has long referred to the people jailed in the riot as “hostages”.
Donald Trump: "We must not criminalize dissent or demonize political disagreement, which is what's been happening in our country lately at a level that nobody has ever seen before."
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 19, 2024
He adds that "in that spirit," the Democratic Party should stop "labeling their political… pic.twitter.com/E1mrIKe1kM
Despite aides promising that Trump would not even say Biden’s name in the speech, Trump did refer to his opponent and “the damage” he has done.
Meanwhile, Biden has had to cancel campaign events after testing positive for Covid-19, with several US media reports suggesting that he is beginning to accept that he may have to drop out of the election race.
The White House said the 81-year-old is experiencing “mild symptoms” after testing positive for the virus during a campaign trip to Las Vegas this week. He is isolating at his beach house in Delaware, amid mounting opposition within his party.
The New York Times cited several people close to Biden as saying they believe he has begun to accept that he may lose in November to Trump and may have to drop out, with one quoted as saying: “Reality is setting in.”
It quoted the person as saying it would not be a surprise if Biden soon endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him as the Democratic candidate.
Former US president Barack Obama meanwhile had told allies that Biden should “seriously consider the viability of his candidacy,” the Washington Post reported. His office did not comment.
The Axios news outlet separately quoted party figures as saying that Biden could drop out as soon as this weekend, while broadcaster NBC quoted a person close to Biden as saying: “We’re close to the end.”
With reporting from Press Association
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