Just days after an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania, Donald Trump took to the stage at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee to a crowd of cheering, adoring fans and accepted the GOP presidential nomination for the third time in a decade.
Trump, who said he would stress a message of “unity” following the attempt on his life, pledged to “launch a new era of safety, prosperity and freedom for citizens of every race, religion, color and creed.”
“The discord and division in our society must be healed, we must heal it quickly,” Trump said in a somber, subdued tone. “As Americans, we are bound together by a single fate and a shared destiny. We rise together, or we fall apart."
"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," he continued. "So tonight, with faith and devotion, I proudly accept your nomination for president of the United States.”
But that tone of unity didn’t last very long at all.
After recounting the assassination attempt in riveting detail, Trump — who on Thursday the first convicted felon to be a major political party’s nominee — quickly launched into a diatribe about the criminal prosecutions against him.
"We must not criminalize dissent or demonize political disagreement," Trump said, before veering into politics: "In that spirit, the Democrat Party should immediately stop weaponizing the Justice System and labeling their political opponent as an enemy of democracy, especially since that is not true. I am the one saving democracy.”
"If Democrats want to unify our country they should drop these partisan witch hunts," he added.
Throughout his remarks, which sounded less like a venerated keynote address and more like his typical freewheeling rally stump speeches, he attacked “crazy Nancy Pelosi,” charged that the world is “teetering on the edge of World War III,” claimed that countries are “emptying out their insane asylums” and sending them into the U.S., and falsely accused Democrats of “cheating on elections.”
Referring to the 2020 election, Trump vowed: “The election result, we're never going to let that happen again.”
He referred to Hungary’s nationalist prime minister Viktor Orbán a “a very powerful and tough leader” and said North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un would “like to see me back” in power — “I think he misses me,” he said of Kim — and called COVID-19 the “China virus.”
And despite advisers saying he would not mention his opponent, President Joe Biden, he did, indeed, invoke the Democratic incumbent and his administration multiple times.
“If you add up the 10 worst presidents they wouldn’t have done the damage that Biden has done,” Trump said. “Biden, I’m not going to use that name anymore — just one time. The damage that he's done to this country is unthinkable. It's unthinkable.”
While Trump did appear to deviate from his previously promised unity message in his speech, which is believed to be the longest convention speech in modern U.S. history at more than 90 minutes, he did offer his vision for a second term and urged his supporters to come out in droves in November to whisk him back into the White House.
“Four years ago we were a great nation, and we will soon be a great nation again,” he pledged.
Here are takeaways from Trump's nomination acceptance speech and the final night of the RNC:
“Let me begin this evening by expressing my gratitude to the American people for your outpouring of love and support following the assassination attempt at my rally on Saturday,” Trump said after formally accepting the GOP nomination.
“As you already know, the assassin’s bullet came within a quarter of an inch of taking my life. So many people have asked me what happened," Trump said, adding: "I’ll tell you what happened, and you’ll never hear it from me a second time, because it’s actually too painful to tell.”
Trump described Saturday as a "warm, beautiful day" in Butler, Pa.
"I went to the stage and the crowd was cheering wildly, everyone was happy," he continued. "I was speaking very strongly and happily because I was discussing the great job my administration did on immigration at the southern border. We were very proud of it."
He described turning to his right to read a chart about border crossing numbers, "when I heard a loud whizzing sound and felt something hit me really, really hard on my right ear. I said to myself 'Wow, what was that?' It can only be a bullet."
"I moved my right hand to my ear, brought it down. My hand was covered with blood, just absolutely blood all over the place."
He said he knew he was "under attack" and dropped to the ground.
"Bullets were continuing to fly," he said, praising the "brave" Secret Service who "rushed to the stage ... these are great people, at great risk, let me tell you."
"There was blood pouring everywhere, but in a certain way I felt very safe, because I had God on my side, I felt that," Trump said to applause.
If he didn't turn, he said, the assassin's bullet would've hit its mark, and he wouldn't be standing before the RNC crowd Thursday night.
He also praised the crowd for not moving and causing a stampede and pointing out the would-be assassin. "By not stampeding, many lives were saved."
"But that's not the reason why they moved," Trump said, adding that they "knew" Trump was in trouble. "They knew it was a shot to the head, they saw the blood."
"They're incredible people," he said of his supporters.
"I'm not supposed to be here tonight," Trump said, met with chants from the crowd of, "Yes you are!"
"I stand before you only by the grace of Almighty God," he added.
When he rose from the ground, he said, his supporters were surprised because believed he was dead. To let them know he was okay, Trump said, he raised his arm in a now-infamous photo and chanted "Fight! Fight! Fight", a cheer used throughout the four days of the RNC.
Once they saw Trump, he said, the crowd "roared for their country" unlike anything he heard before.
"For the rest of my life I will be grateful for the love shown" by the audience at that rally, Trump said.
He also honored Corey Comperatore, the former fire chief killed in the incident, as well as the two others injured, and said he spoke with their families. "Our love and prayers are with them and they always will be."
"They were serious Trumpsters, and still are," Trump added, before calling Comperatore "highly respected."
"He lost his life selflessly, acting as a human shield" to protect his family," Trump said of Comperatore. "What a fine man he was."
The crowd chanted "Corey! Corey! Corey!" in response, then applauded as Trump presented Comperatore's fire helmet and uniform on stage.
"Despite such a heinous attack, we unite this evening more determined than ever, I am more determined than ever," Trump said. "Our resolve is unbroken, and our purpose is unchanged: to deliver a government that serves the American People."
In the aftermath of the shooting, Trump and his surrogates said that his speech would emphasize a message of unity, with the former president saying he rewrote his original speech after the attack.
If there was unity, it didn't last long, with Trump quickly pivoting from his recounting of his assassination attempt to the criminal cases against him.
"We must not criminalize dissent or demonize political disagreement," Trump said, before veering into politics: "In that spirit, the Democrat Party should immediately stop weaponizing the Justice System and labeling their political opponent as an enemy of democracy, especially since that is not true. I am the one saving democracy."
Trump gave a shoutout to the judge overseeing his classified documents case, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who he nominated to the federal bench during his first term, for dismissing the case against him. He called Cannon a "highly respected federal judge" and praised her for "finding that the prosecutor and the fake documents case against me were totally unconstitutional and the entire case was thrown out."
"If Democrats want to unify our country they should drop these partisan witch hunts," Trump said.
Trump's speech was full of familiar themes and grievances, refererring to the former House Speaker as "crazy Nancy Pelosi," accusing Democrats of "destroying our country" and "cheating on elections."
Trump laid out his vision for the country, one that included being respected and even feared on the world stage and having secure borders.
He criticized President Joe Biden over immigration, inflation and the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and said he wound put an end to all three issues, each of which he called a “crisis.” He again said the wars would not have happened if he had been president at the time.
Trump did not plan to say Biden’s name in the speech, according to multiple reports citing his advisers. But ad-libbing at times in the speech, he eventually did say the president’s name.
“If you took the 10 worst presidents in the history of the United States … they will not have done the damage that Biden has done,” Trump said before adding, “Only going to use the term once — ‘Biden.’”
Trump said: “Under our leadership, the United States will be respected again. No nation will question our power. No enemy will doubt our might. Our borders will return law and order to our streets, patriotism to our schools. And importantly, we will restore peace, stability and harmony all throughout the world.
“But to achieve this future, we must first rescue our nation from failed and even incompetent leadership,” he added.
Trump had previously said he was changed by being Saturday’s assassination attempt and wanted to project a message of unity. But he struggled to maintain that sentiment Thursday.
“To every citizen, whether you're a young or old, man or woman, Democrat, Republican or independent, Black or a white, Asian or a Hispanic, I extend to you a hand of loyalty and of friendship,” he said.
But moments later, he repeated false claims about Democrats cheating in the 2020 election.
Repeating many of the false and misleading claims about immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border he often mentions at political rallies, Trump dedicated 15 minutes of his lengthy acceptance speech on Thursday night to railing against an ‘invasion’ of migrants and promising a mass deportation operation of millions from the United States.
“To keep our families safe, the Republican platform promises to launch the largest deportation operation in the history of our country,” Trump said about 45 minutes into his remarks, before bringing up high-profile incidents of violent crimes allegedly perpetrated by migrants. “Tonight, America, this is my vow. I will not let these killers and criminals into our country.”
He repeatedly referred to the flow of migrants across the U.S.-Mexico border as an “invasion” and said “they are coming in from every corner of the Earth, not just from South America, but from Africa, Asia, the Middle East.” He implied, as he has said directly before, that countries were emptying out their prisons and mental institutions and compared the migrants arriving in the U.S. to the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter.
“I will end the illegal immigration crisis by closing our border and finishing the wall, most of which I've already built,” Trump said, despite building only 80 miles of new barriers on the U.S.-Mexico border during his first term, according to a BBC analysis at the end of his time in office.
“We have to stop the invasion into our country that's killing hundreds of thousands of people a year. We're not going to let that happen.”
There is no evidence to support the claim “hundreds of thousands of people” are being killed a year by migrants in the U.S. In fact, “immigrants are 30 percent less likely to be incarcerated than are U.S.-born individuals who are white,” a Stanford University report from last year found. The right-wing Cato Institute reported in 2020 that immigrants, regardless of their legal status, were less likely to commit crimes than native-born Americans.
He also said “cities are being flooded with illegal aliens” and “Americans are being squeezed out of the labor force and their jobs are taken.” The latest employment numbers from the Department of Labor show the unemployment rate is at a near-record low 4.1% and data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows that, after record-high border crossings during the Biden administration, arrests at the U.S.-Mexico border have dropped to their lowest level since Biden took office in June.
“By the way, you know who's taking the jobs, the jobs that are created. 107% of those jobs are taken by illegal aliens. And you know who's being hurt the most by millions of people pouring into our country: the Black population and the Hispanic population,” Trump went on to say. “Because they're taking the jobs from our Black population, our Hispanic population, and they're also taking them from unions. The unions are suffering because of it.”
Trump has made an effort to appeal to Hispanic and Black Americans, as well as union members, as he seeks to return to the White House. The Republican National Convention has highlighted anti-immigrant Hispanic speakers, pro-Trump Black leaders and a speech by Teamsters president Sean O’Brien.
Trump also discussed “the chart that saved my life,” a graphic produced by the office of Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson that Trump turned his head to view on Saturday at a Pennsylvania rally the moment a would-be assassin fired his first shot. Trump walked away with a wound to his ear, but said on Thursday “without that chart I would not be here today.” The chart was displayed on the large video screens behind Trump on stage on Thursday.
The chart shows U.S.-Mexico border encounters by Border Patrol and by U.S. officials at ports of entry from 2012 to 2024, noting key developments in border policies over the course of time. It shows massive growth in border crossings during the Biden administration.
“Because of this very foolish administration, the greatest invasion in history is taking place right here in our country,” Trump said. “They're coming from everywhere. They're coming at levels that we've never seen before. It is an invasion indeed, and this administration does absolutely nothing to stop them.”
During the final speech of the Republican National Convention, former President Donald Trump pledged to drive down prices and “end the devastating inflation crisis immediately.”
He promised to bring down interest rates, lower the cost of energy and “drill, baby, drill. By doing that, we will lead a large-scale decline in prices. Prices will start to come down.” (Domestic energy production hit record highs under President Joe Biden's administration.)
He pledged to bring back the American dream.
Reiterating a point made by multiple speakers several times over the past several days, Trump charged that prices have soared under Biden, from grocery and gasoline prices to mortgage rates.
“Republicans have adopted a plan for American renewal,” he said, calling them a series of bold promises that he will swiftly implement with the help of a Republican House and Senate.
He pledged to drive down prices and make America affordable again from day one by slashing prices for energy, transportation, manufacturing and all household goods.
“We’ll start paying off debt and start lowering taxes even further,” Trump said. “We gave you the largest tax cut, we’ll do it more.”
Growth in the U.S. will pay off the American deficit, Trump said.
He said it was “the ridiculous waste of taxpayer dollars” on “the meaningless Green New scam” that has fueled inflation. (The Green New Deal, a wide-ranging proposal to combat climate change, has never been enacted.)
On his first day in office, if elected, he promised to end Biden’s goal that half of all new vehicles in the U.S. be zero emissions by 2030. Doing so will save the U.S. auto industry and U.S. customers thousands of dollars on each car purchase. He also pledged to prevent new auto manufacturing plants in Mexico, China and other countries.
“They’re being built by China to make cars and sell them into our country — no tax, no anything. The UAW ought to be ashamed for allowing this to happen,” he said, before calling for UAW president Shawn Fain’s firing.
“We’re going to bring back car manufacturing, and we’re going to bring it back fast,” Trump said.
“We will not let countries come in, take our jobs and plunder our nation,” he said, adding that he will impose taxes, tariffs and incentives so that automakers can only sell cars in the U.S. if they build cars in the U.S. He suggested a tax of up to 200% on Chinese vehicles, after which the crowd erupted into chants of “U.S.A.”
Trump said the center of his plan for economic prosperity is “massive tax cuts for workers,” including no taxes on tips for restaurant workers, bartenders, hospitality workers, caddies, barbers, movers and others who rely on them.
”I got that by having dinner in Nevada recently, where we’re leading by about 14 points,” he said, recounting the story of a “smart” waitress on the Las Vegas strip who said most tips are processed through cards.
He also pledged to protect Social Security and Medicare, without providing specifics about how he would do so -- though notably he did attack his 2024 primary opponents, like former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley for proposing entitlement reforms.
Under his plan, he said, “incomes will skyrocket, inflation will vanish completely, jobs will come roaring back and the middle class will prosper like never ever before and we’re going to do it very rapidly.”
Late in his 92 minute speech, Trump returned to his pledges to reform the nation's foreign affairs under his own version of peace through strength.
"As we bring security to our streets, we will help bring stability to the world," Trump said, before wandering off script and growing wistful. "We were the toughest, most respected — and you saw this, Hungary, strong country run by a very powerful tough leader, a tough guy...Viktor Orban," a noted authoritarian who has allied with other authoritarian governments and frequently flattered Trump.
There's only one way to solve terrorism and violent migrants entering countries, Orban allegedly said, per the Republican: "You got to bring President Trump back to the United States because he kept everybody at bay."
Trump quoted Orban as saying that "Russia was afraid of him, China was afraid of him. Everybody was afraid of him."
Russia, Trump said, opted against invading other countries while Trump was in office. North Korea, he said, got along well with Trump's America — "I get along with him, he'd like to see me back, too, I think he misses me," Trump said of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un.
Trump then decried the withdrawal of American soldiers from Afghanistan — a protracted withdrawal that was agreed to under Trump and completed under Biden, during which the Taliban struck and killed 13 American military service members.
Trump then knocked the Biden administration (though not by name, as he refused to name Biden more than twice during his speech) for Russian submarines hanging 60 miles off of American coastlines. (Though Trump neglected to mention that a Russian spy ship was spotted 30 miles off of Connecticut less than a month into his presidency.)
Trump pledged to build an Iron Dome missile defense system in the United States, similar to the one employed by Israel and mixing up the name of a similar system Ronald Reagan tried to build. ("They called it star ship, space ship,” Trump said of Regan's plan, which was nicknamed Star Wars.)
"And this great Iron Dome will be built entirely in the USA,” Trump said. “We have unbelievable technology. And why should other countries have this?"
He then repeated a promise to end the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine soon after entering office, if elected.
"I'll tell you this: we want our hostages back, and they better be back before I assume office, or you will be paying a very big price," Trump threatened to Hamas.
If panicked Democrats and antsy members of President Joe Biden's administration and campaign were looking for a reprieve from the calls for the incumbent to exit the race following his debate performance last month, they may be breathing a sigh of relief after Trump's freewheeling speech,
President Joe Biden’s Campaign Chair Jen O'Malley Dillon hit back at former President Donald Trump’s speech, saying he “rambled on” and criticizing him for his role in overturning Roe v. Wade and the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.
“He failed to mention how he had inflicted pain and cruelty on the women of America by overturning Roe v. Wade,” the statement from O’Malley Dillon read. “He failed to mention his plan to take over the civil service and to pardon the January 6th insurrectionists.”
She also criticized Trump on the economy after earlier in the night the president’s team accused his Republican rival of running “the economy into the ground” and noted he left office with “the worst jobs record since Herbert Hoover,” a line Biden often uses himself during speeches.
“Donald Trump who destroyed our economy, ripped away rights, and failed middle class families,” she continued. “Now he pursues the presidency with an even more extreme vision for where he wants to take this country.”
O’Malley Dillon also hit Trump for failing to mention Project 2025, the right-wing policy platform curated by conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation that the Biden camp has vigorously tried to tie to Trump, even as the former president has sought to distance himself from it.
“Trump’s Project 2025 agenda is the single biggest attack on our personal freedoms and way of life ever proposed in modern American history,” her statement Thursday night read.
“The stakes have never been higher. The choice has never been more clear. President Biden is more determined than ever to defeat Donald Trump and his Project 2025 agenda in November,” she wrote.
The speakers and performers at the final night of the convention were an eclectic bunch, to say the least.
Hogan, the wrestling icon, hit the stage to talk up Trump, saying, “With our leader up there, my hero, that gladiator, we're going to bring America back together, one real American at a time, brother!
“When I look out and I see all the real Americans, I think about how Donald Trump, his family was compromised. When I look out there and I see Donald Trump, I think about how his business was compromised. But what happened last week, when they took a shot at my hero and they tried to kill the next president of the United States, enough was enough. And I said, ‘Let Trumpamania run wild, brother! Let Trumpamania rule again! Let Trumpamania make America great again!”
As he was speaking, Hogan, who said he’s known Trump for 35 years, took off his sports coat and ripped off one tanktop to reveal a Trump-Vance tanktop underneath it. The audience roared.
But the man playing Hulk Hogan stepped out of character during the speech.
“My name is Terry Bollea, and as an entertainer … I tried to stay out of politics,” he said. “But after everything that's happened to our country over the past four years and everything that happened last weekend, I can no longer stay silent. I'm here tonight because I want the world to know that Donald Trump is a real American hero, and I'm proud to support my hero as the next president of this United States.”
Hogan was among three speakers on the night with a background in fighting-related entertainment. Also there supporting Trump were former World Wrestling Entertainment CEO Linda McMahon and Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO Dana White.
White, who has has known Donald Trump for 25 years, spending hours and hours of his life on the phone with and beside the man — so when Trump called his friend, the president and CEO of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, asking for White to introduce him at the RNC, White immediately accepted. Then Trump reached out with a message, apologizing that White has to interrupt a family trip for the occasion.
"That's the President Trump that I know, a man who truly cares about people. The mainstream media likes to push the narrative that he doesn't care about anyone but himself. Absolutely not," White said.
"I'm not telling you what to think, I'm tell you what I know: I know President Trump is a fighter. Now look at what's happened over the last 10 years," White said. "I'm in the tough guy business, and this man is the toughest, most resilient human being I've met in my life."
Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson received a hero's welcome at the Republican National Convention on Thursday, painting a dark picture of America with former President Donald Trump as the “leader of this nation” who will take on lawmakers in Washington who “step over the prostrate bodies of their fellow citizens, [overdosing] on drugs to go cast votes to send money to some foreign country.”
Carlson said he watched the assassination attempt of Trump in Pennsylvania over the weekend “about 50 times” and said it was “divine intervention” that the former president lived. Trump, who he said he spoke with hours after the shooting, underwent a transformation, according to Carlson.
“When he stood up after being shot in the face, bloodied, and put his hand up, I thought at that moment, that was a transformation. This was no longer a man,” Carlson said. “He was no longer just a political party's nominee or a former president or a future president. This was the leader of a nation.”
Carlson explained that “just because you call yourself the president doesn’t mean much inherently,” poking at concerns about President Joe Biden’s health and ability to continue to do the job at 81. He argued “a mannequin, a dead person” could become president “with enough cheating.”
“But being a leader is very different. It's not a title. It's organic. You can't name someone a leader. A leader is the bravest man. That's who the leader is. That is true in all human organizations. This is a law of nature,” Carlson said. “And in that moment, Donald Trump, months before the presidential election, became the leader of this nation.”
Former first lady Melania Trump, who has largely been absent from the campaign trail, and Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka, formerly a senior adviser in his White House, also appeared at the convention, but neither spoke.
And not to be outdone, Kid Rock performed his song "American Bad Ass," leading the crowd in chants of "Fight! Fight!" and "Trump! Trump!"