unity. >> that does it for us tonight. rachel maddow picks up coverage of night four of the republican national convention with donald trump's speech coming up. you made it! you made it, thank you for joining us tonight. you made it. it is a last night, the final night of the 2024 republican national convention, which has been held this week in milwaukee, wisconsin. incidentally, milwaukee, wisconsin is located in milwaukee county, wisconsin, a county won by democrat joe biden by more than 40 points in the last election. that gives you sort of the opening irony and opening, i guess appropriate framing in

terms of how strange so much of this week has been. not just in terms of what it has been like in terms of the proceedings, what it has been like in context, what this night means. tonight, the republican convention comes to its conclusion as the republican party presidential nominee gives his acceptance speech. he is given the acceptance speech, i think it cannot be overstated, he is giving the acceptance speech in truly unique, even bizarre circumstances. there is no nicer way to say this, he is a felon, recently convicted of 34 felony criminal charges, now awaiting sentences for those charges facing up to four years in prison. he is also under indictment in other jurisdictions, multi- count r.i.c.o. criminal indictment under georgia state law but multi- count federal criminal indictment in d.c. district court in washington. happily, for the nominee, just adding to the weirdness of it

for the rest of us, at this moment, he is no longer facing multiple additional felony federal charges in florida under the espionage act but that is only thanks to a shock ruling from a judge he appointed in his last days in office. the shock ruling is being appealed, which means if the appeal by prosecutors is successful, we might expect the nominee will end up federally indicted under the espionage act again in addition to the other charges he is still facing. the espionage act charges relate to bizarre revelations about him hoarding and hiding hundreds of classified documents including very classified documents at his home in florida after his presidency, even after federal authorities let him know he had these documents when he should not have and he needed to give them back. the charges of which he was already convicted in new york derive from him using the

family business he inherited from his father to cover payments he made to a woman named stormy daniels to try to stop her from speaking publicly before the 2016 election about an unpleasant sexual encounter, she says that she endured with mr. trump about a year after he married the former first lady, melania trump not longer after she gave birth to their son. also, mr. trump denied that alleged sexual encounter took place, mrs. trump, millenia trump, was conspicuously absent from the trial, even when the jury delivered the verdict, guilty on all 34 felony counts. mrs. trump has been even more conspicuously absent from every one of his campaign trail events this entire year and almost all his other events as well. since he left the white house, which is not a typical president and first lady arrangement, which is fine, who among us knows what makes anyone else's marriage?

love is a many splendored thing. that record of her -- >> i want everybody to know at home and you on the television, be on your best behavior. the record of melania trump avoiding being seen with her husband, ever, for years at a time and it does make it notable we are about to see something very unusual, about to see within the next few minutes that she is in milwaukee tonight, she is in the building at the republican convention for donald trump's acceptance of the republican presidential nomination this evening. that itself notable and unusual circumstance. when donald trump left the presidency in january 2021, he did not attend the inauguration

of his successor, that itself unique in american history. trump left in his wake the worst incidents of political violence the country has ever seen in a presidential transition. the only time we have not had peaceful transition of power from one president to the next, arguably ever, arguably since the civil war, criminal charges still pending against the republican presidential nominee, the ones in georgia and washington relate to his refusal to leave office after he was voted out, they relate to the violent coup attempt that he launched, the mother of his supporters that physically tried to stop congress from certifying the results of the election which he was voted out of office. that election, i remind you, was not close donald trump lost his re-election bid by more than 7 million votes and by more than 70 electoral votes. that electoral failure is

emblematic of his performance as the republican party's leader. he did get elected to the presidency in 2016 but under his leadership, the republican party lost to the house, the republican party lost the senate and the republican party lost the white house when he, as president, really was voted out of office resoundingly after one term, leaving the country in the grips of a crippling covid pandemic, which is going to kill more than a million americans, mitigated only by the advent of effective vaccines come he mostly denigrates and disavows. he also left the country with his supreme court onto which he installed three new, hard-line, ultra conservative justices, who true to his promise, soon overturned roe versus wade. throwing women's rights in this country into a very, very fast reverse gear, ushering in the canyon abortion bans in republican-controlled states across the country. leading quickly, thereafter, to

republican led efforts to ban in vitro fertilization, to even ban and restrict birth control, leading republicans in washington and influential conservative advocacy groups to start their plans for national abortion ban for birth control restrictions and even things like a ban on pornography, ban on no-fault divorce. it is a wild record on which to try to build a return to power. but here we are, they are nominating a felon, one who left office in a storm of violence, among other things injured dozens of police officers, violence for which hundreds of his supporters have pled guilty or been convicted of serious crimes. >> we put criminals where they belong, in jail. >> cops are good, criminals are bad. >> donald trump stands with the people and the police asked the

men and women in blue, not the criminals and the rioters. >> has made for very awkward republican national convention because he literally does stand with the rioters to promising that he will spring them all from prison. calling them martyrs and political prisoners, saying that they have been unjustly persecuted and that they did nothing wrong. after this is how he left office, after a ransacked capitol was left in the wake of the mob of his supporters that he sent to congress to physically use force to keep him in power. it did not seem, at the time, like it would ever be an open question as to whether america would try to see this is good. a thing that was a great try and we are sure glad they did that, we wish these people have done more but, they had gotten their way these people take during and bear spring police officers and smashing their way, literally smashing their way onto the floor of congress.

rifling through senators' desks and taking what they wanted to and ransacking the speaker's office. it did not seem, at the time, like we had any lack of clarity as a country as whether or not it would be a good thing or bad thing for our country is this guy, with the paramilitary gear and the zip ties, to tie people up. it did not seem like we had any lack of clarity in considering whether it would be a good thing if this guy had gotten his hands on the members of congress he was hunting for. what was he going to do with those that ties and what if it had been the vice president? that is where we are. tonight, with the republican party, almost by acclamation, nominating the man that used

that violence to try to stay in power, nominating to him once again become president. only this time, they picked him a running mate who says, you would not have threatened to hang him to try to get him to go along with the coup. ohio senator j.d. vance was picked for the job after he said publicly, on television, had he been the vice president when this happened, he would have done it, he would've gone along with it, thrown out the results of the election. it has only been 3 1/2 years, 88 felony counts against donald trump since then, but the republican party is back offering more of this, please. this is the rnc, republican national convention saw one of trump's former advisers take a plane to the convention direct from prison, unlike many other trump advisers, he was not in jail on fraud or corruption charges.

he was in jail after he took credit for helping to conceive of and to try to implement the plan to stop the certification of the election results, to try to pressure vice president mike pence to rejecting the results from states trump lost. peter navarro took credit for conceiving and trying to implement that plan and refuse to subpoenas to testify about it. that is why he had to come to the rnc from prison, whereupon he received the largest hero's welcome any of the speakers or guests have received on any of the knights of the convention this week. he was just one of the figures he faced criminal charges related to the coup, who was celebrated at the convention this week, the fake trump electors from nevada this week and just recently had the charges against them dropped on jurisdictional technical grounds, several of them are

delegates to the republican convention. along with the fake electors from michigan, there under criminal indictments, several of them are delegates to this convention, so are some of the fake electors from arizona, under criminal felony indictment. they are also delegates to the rest republican national convention. all seven states that participated in the fake electors scheme as part of the coup to try to keep trump in power after he was voted out, all seven states, republican parties in all seven of those states have said at least one of their fake electors to be a delegate at this republican national convention. that is just the flavor of it. two of the former president's other advisers, whom he pardoned after they were convicted of federal crimes and sentenced to prison, two of them, you can see them here, spotted on the rnc floor in milwaukee mobbed by fans. greeted them. we have been slowly boiling in this water. we have been slowly boiling in this reality for long enough,

it is possible to lose sight of how radical this moment actually is. republicans really are going to nominate a felon, who tried to overthrow the u.s. government by force, in spite of all the people that went to prison for it, they decided that force was justified. and that they, they in no way, shape, or form are not suggesting they would do it again. to the contrary, it is the plan, the republican party is this time planning overtly in advance, there is not going to be a normal certification of the election this year. they have laid the groundwork already and implementing effort already to have republican county and state officials refused to certify the election results from the get go. why would they do that? the consequence of that is there will not be state certified election results. sitting there tidy in a box waiting to be opened and counted ceremonially on january 6th. there will not be state

certified election results, there can just be a count of which state was one tbyte each candidate, which is how we are supposed to look president in this country to the new york times put it recently, quote, the study involves ambitious and legally dubious event to reimagine decades of settled law dictating how results are officially certified in the weeks before the transfer power. here is where we are, the first time the republican party chose donald trump as their nominee for president, he won the presidential election and his presidency is viewed by historians as the worst presidency in the history of the united states. he was impeached twice. the second time they chose him as the party nominee for president, he lost the general election and it ended in a violent failed effort to retain power by force. now they are choosing him again. with whatever you call the opposite of regret for having worked out the last time. and with all that explicit promise to do it again.

so here we go. next round starts tonight. nicole, i turn to you and i laughed. >> two nights in a row to watch at home, it is different, i have my mommy water, my dogs, it takes your breath away. taking my breath away two nights in a row. i think the thing that is so important to understand, and thing and back to an interview sean hannity, i don't know who is interviewing you, sean hannity and geraldo were talking, talking jovially about how nixon would have never had to leave had sean been around. we started putting the pieces together how we got here, talk radio grafting under the republican party, rhetorically. this is a political movement that cannot totally codependent on this information. as sort of the right-wing media ecosystem became more, people

used to change channels, now they are locked into fox news. if they flip around, they will see how newsmax is covering the same conspiracy. what trump did at the beginning of his presidency, i think it was the winter of 2017, he said to his supporters at a rally, i don't know why normal president is at a rally in 2017, he said, don't believe your eyes, don't believe your ears, just believe me. he also took into the presidency, the brand of the media is the enemy of the people. it sounded weird, the publisher of the new york times, i'm not worried about us in this country but around the world, danger for journalists. trump refuse to stop saying it, why couldn't he have press exist, why couldn't he have is people believe anything but him ? what he wanted to achieve, he could not do if anyone had access to facts. the third pillar of it as president was dismantling the rule of law. that was clunky at first firing

comey, let mike flynn go. the project, round two will not resemble round one at all, there will not be investigative stories. by the end of his presidency, he tapped new york times journalists' phone, his doj had done that and tapped -- >> i forgot about that. >> there will be no investigative journalism because he will know what they write and i don't know what the stories would be sourced by because he will dismantle the federal government. round two dozen have a, it is so much more radical. >> the thing i have to keep reminding myself about, it has not been a long time since all of this happened. joe biden has been president 3 1/2 years, since july, 3 1/2 years to talk about the record he has been able to accomplish in things he has been able to do, it has only been 3 1/2 years since the teargas and broken windows and human

excrement in the rotunda, the ransacked offices, the parliamentarian's office, the speaker's office, since all of that happened. in the telling of it, the republican party has turned that not only into something that seems like a long time ago, internally, they've turned it into a virtue. there's a reason all of the fake elector are delegates. there's a reason peter navarro was on the stage, he was not a big enough deal in the trump administration to serve being on the stage until he went to prison because that crucible, that failed violent effort to hold power by force, is now their, it is who they are, it is the reason for being, it is their 1776. it has become a virtue, once you have defined it that way, you are certain to do it again. >> first of all, thank you for playing that video. i feel like, if we can play that january 6th video every time we are on tv, it would not be enough.

because i think it is easy to memory hole something an entire branch of our industry, our business, conservative media rebranded as a virtue, something good. >> peaceful protest. >> they decided not to forget it but celebrate it. donald trump opens his rallies with the wrongly incarcerated, poorly treated, blah blah blah. recently, i went to wilmington, north carolina for an event. 1898, wilmington, north carolina experienced a coup. the black-and-white multiracial government, reconstruction government, which was miraculous and succeeding and making life better for the formerly enslaved and the white poor in wilmington and changing things was overthrown. it was overthrown by former confederate soldiers were offended by an editorial in the black newspaper that was advocating that we may be

stopped lynching, advocating against lynching. as a result, the whole government was wiped out of existence, black and white, people were killed, some 300 people. when i was down there, they took me to this park that they created as a memorial, this beautiful memorial to that, they called it a riot but it wasn't a riot, it was the overthrowing of a government. that became, not something in north carolina textbooks was pointed out as a terrible thing, it became a thing that was forgotten. the people who did it remained in power, took power, then passed laws to make sure that no multiracial government could be elected again, they passed from father clauses, jim crow style laws to ensure that they would disenfranchise black people. i tell you that story, per what you showed us and took us through, what enraged donald trump personally is the

humiliation of losing the joe biden, thank you for putting up the margin. he lost by 7 million votes and he was embarrassed. rather than accept defeat and be a man and an adult, he decided to construct the whole fiction that he did not lose. all of these people glommed onto it because it comported with this thing in there gut had to be true because how the hell did barack obama get re- elected, get elected by 10 million, then 5 million votes, when he lost the white vote ? you might want to the majority of blacks, hispanics, white americans voted 60/40 the other way, even re-elected, including 18 to 30, young whites and old whites voted for the other guy and obama still won. how did joe biden win? over the objections, majority of white americans, everybody that they know had lawn signs for trump, i did not know anyone that voted for biden with a suspect is these other

people, the multiracial democracy, the liberal whites, the blacks, the browns, the immigrants, they imagine in this fiction that undocumented immigrants are voting, they have come up with a fiction that helps donald trump's ego but also helps them and helps them explain why they can't have their way. why won't women marry in their 20s and give them babies? why they be the kind of life that we expect and are ran father sat, why won't they complied, while in society be the way it was for my grandpa? you know what, maybe we need a revolution to make them do it. >> i'm struck by, as you said, less than four years since joe biden has been in office, you often ruined his history repeats, her mind is better than anyone else. history also repeats in a short period of time, what is striking to me and what i'm think about recently, not that long since the republican party, really the country thought that trump is done. this is behind us. this was horrible, we need

investigation, there needs to be january 6th committee but that was so bad, it is done and it is over. there's also that thought about the intervention, shall i say, of the russians and their role in this and look at how history repeated to some degree in that capacity as well. now, to your point of your opening, it is almost like they have become better at it. look at the enablers and how they have been empowered. four years ago, when all the horror happen, mike pence attempted to stand up to that, he is a vice presidential nominee who has had publicly, he is all for fake electors. mike johnson is miraculously the speaker of the house and was an enabler around january 6th then, he was a key architect, who is now empowered to help. there has been some laws that change, key to power again, three years after all of this happen, more than that after

russia played a role in our 2016 election. one of the key witnesses, the key witness in the republicans' effort to impeach joe biden may or may not be an asset. we all think it is behind us but i think what it exposes maybe that my appetite about our political system and not its strength or weakness but what is possible that can happen within it. >> there is, i am sympathetic and open to the arguments it is a bad thing for democracy to have the criminal law and political world come into a dovetailed relationship. we don't want to be a country where people are worried about there being vindictive prosecutions, there's a reason people are very stressed out about what donald trump says he wants to do with the justice department and what project 2025 the thing they should, the green light of the supreme court. i get that.

if in your system of government that there is no way to box somebody out future political anticipation, once i have tried to dismantle the country, once they have invited foreign interference, once i have used violence to try to overturn an election results, what is to stop it from happening again? if there is not some sort of winding termination, we don't have a system in our country where people apologized, they themselves. before their fellow citizens and say, i'm out, i have done something shameful, i will not do this again. here's trump walking into the fiserv arena in milwaukee. because of that, we don't have a guarantee that these things will not happen again, part of things that happen in the trunk are are so serious, that is why the criminal law has been invoked, for one of the first times ever, in american president in history ever. part of the reason for that is to try to ensure that things like this are never ever again part of our system.

these things have not gone away. >> there's a couple reasons about. first of all, you're exactly right, there's a reason why investigators and the fbi and intelligence services consult with, whenever they can, the criminals. and the murderers and bank robbers because you learn about your own abilities by learning as much as you can about how they do what they do. we had a very rough, painful, nasty at times, violent consultation by this would be democracy bank robber because what if you done, would expose. the only ray of light, can i give you a ray of light? >> yes. >> only ray of light i would offer that i think is definitely true, we just discussed and documented much of what has been done to this country in this recent period. it does not mean the values and goals have actually been destroyed. the spectacle here and the delegates and state sides all refer to democracy and even in this gathering, they want to

claim this is a democracy, even though there has been a lot of attacks on it, even the republican primary, donald trump, before he won the states, tried to take control of the party. the law still matters, even amidst the disinformation campaigns, they reference criminal investigations and findings, they have a different take on it . the truth still matters, there is you know the truth does matter tonight, is how much they have to lie about it because the worry is the truth would be a problem. we are old enough to remember interviewers and citizens are old enough to remember when january 6th was so bad, the light was that somebody else did it, could not possibly have had did this. >> the fbi did it. >> inside job. it is funny, if you only listen to part of what i'm saying or clipped selectively, you might mishear me, that is bad. it also shows the truth was powerful and they had to lie about it because the truth in that recent moment, the memory

hole, it was so bad, he had to blame it on someone else. over time, with disinformation, fox news, that loss in the courts because the truth matters, they paid a lot of money and defamation, some of those cases continue, they move the ball. i can see mr. hogan, they move the ball and the goalpost and took it somewhere else. it is not because people don't care anymore, that is what they want you to believe, it is not because the truth doesn't matter, they would not have to spend so much time lying about it. >> i would like to comment on the vulgarity. i hate you have to answer this question, nicole, but you're going to. >> quite the setup. >> there's a certain vulgarity to this spectacle and to a family takeover of a political party, if you're russian, it is very czarist to have one family takeover political party. lara trump is the vice chairman

of the rnc, she personally takes care of it. lena holba was speaking earlier and crying when she was a member of the family, everyone has changed their appearances, they all look like versions of melania trump, made themselves physically look the same, the men wear the same clothes as donald trump, cosplay him. it is morphing a party, more than a cult of personality, it is a cult of one family, they owned this party and have shooed away, there's no one left here, there's no paul ryan, mitt romney, george w. bush, very fourth of july, not at the republican convention. >> can you imagine? >> not the cabinet members, where are any of the members of donald trump's former cabinet? none of them, even the right- wing members, bill barr, enabler of the highest order or

the lowest order, even he does not feel comfortable there, this takeover is seriously vulgar. i have to imagine for someone in the party, i don't even know how you process it. >> not anymore, i guess that is step one. two, i think the selection of j.d. vance is part of the story you told. j.d. vance also had the distinction of being donald trump juniors in agreements together. did a story the day before on his rising political star inside the family. when he wrote his first book, first interviewed george stephanopoulos, he describes going to trump tower for his first briefing, he told trump about the -- everyone can hear me. >> i will apologize to closed captioning.

>> what he describes as he walks in, there's this weird mix of what you're describing, family members, office staff, future secretaries, it was like a circus. it had this feeling of the family. traditionally, it was a liability to be part of the family, dynastic policies repel voters because it was not with the idea was. i'm sorry, people are hungry to hear all of this, we are getting a lot of it. >> the words are not the most important to the speaker. >> he has done his shirt ripping. >> them is animated we have seen donald trump all week. >> i think to your point, it is another sign, it is another thing traditionally people of not like, don't like being lied to, grifted, these are things normally political liabilities. >> i don't know what to do about that.

i'm a wrestling fan. i don't need to hear it. we will take a quick break. we are glad you're here in the final night of the republican national convention. you made it, you made it with us, you are mad at us for being here, we know. we will take a quick rake and we come back we will hear from a reported tracking the plans by trump allies to short-circuit the election system. it is an incredible story, really important piece of context for you what you will hear tonight from the former president as he accepts the republican party's nomination for the third straight time to stay with us, we will be right back. missing out on the things you love because of asthma? get back to better breathing with fasenra, an add-on treatment for eosinophilic asthma that is taken once every 8 weeks. fasenra is not for sudden breathing problems or other eosinophilic conditions. allergic reactions may occur. don't stop your asthma treatments

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we are watching pro wrestler hulk hogan leave the stage after a performance that involved some good shirt ripping stuff and flexing stuff, he looks great. he was a wrestling champ when i used to come home early from school and i did not feel well so i could watch after school wrestling. he looks like the same guy. hulk hogan, because i'm obsessed, hulk hogan peter thiel connection, talking about the j.d. vance selection as trump's running mate, j.d. vance went to iraq as united

states marine, retired as a corporal in the marine corps. he went to the ohio state, he then went to yale law school, wrote his autobiography. all of the jobs he had were jobs given to him by peter thiel . peter thiel is a person who effectively single-handedly funded his senate campaign, peter thiel is the one introduced him to donald trump, peter thiel played a large role convincing trump to pick j.d. vance as his running mate. peter thiel kind of adopted hulk hogan. peter thiel had a grudge against a very snarky, aggressive media outlet called gawker because he did not like the way they covered him in silicon valley and elements of his personal life. one hulk hogan -- >> you can say tape, sex tape,

peter dr. bankrolled aggressive and creative campaign designed -- >> that was the weird thing, to avenge mr. hogans having been done wrong by this media outlet . it was specifically designed, not just to get redress for mr. hogan, it was designed to put gawker out of business, which it did. peter loaned that lawyer to melania trump to bring antimedia cases of her own. mr. hogan, peter thiel spoke at donald trump's rnc in 2016, now hulk hogan, i don't know if anybody else on that sex tape will appear. everything else going on this week , one story we keep talking back that we keep coming back two, the lead story of the new york times on saturday night before that tragic shooting at a trump rally in pennsylvania that wounded the former president was this, unbowed by january

6th charges, republicans pursue plans to contest a trump defeat, written among other things, by other reporters jim rutenberg at the new york times. republican party and conservative allies engage in unprecedented legal campaign targeting the american voting system, wide-ranging methodical effort laying the groundwork to contest the next election, including attempting to short- circuit the process of ratifying the winter. this is not a backward looking article about what trump and his allies did in 2020, this is about what they are planning on doing this year. this bylined by our next guest, thank you very much for joining us, good to have you here. >> thanks for having me. >> is the scheme that you outlined in your article here, is it a rerun of what happened in january 2020 or is it the kind of thing, the way you

would rerun something if he could do it all better so that this time it would work? >> it is more the latter. at the end of the day, what they traded it in 2020 did not work for those purposes. i want to say, a lot of legal experts believe this won't work either but what we do know is there's a lot going on across this country, to look at that certification process and change it. if your viewers will remember, you did this in your lead of the certification process is exactly what was being dealt with at capitol hill on january 6th. the pageantry of democracy, the act of certifying the election, it is ministerial, there are no two ways about it, you vote to do it and 20 different counties we've seen is where local boards are voting against certifying. it is yet to lead to a big cataclysmic stopping of a certification but has come closer than we have ever seen.

it is unprecedented. >> tell us how that might work, as you outlined in your piece, a county in nevada, say where this happened, has local republican officials who are true believers in this cause and in on this plan and aside, regardless of what happened locally in that election, they are going to refuse to certify the results in their county area what is the knock on effect of that that could ultimately have national consequences? >> you are right, it did happen in wash out county, nevada. this time around, the results were certified, a judge came, court papers were filed, threatening legal action to force the board to certified. the plane landed safely. the concern of what happens when it is the fall and we are up against deadlines, deadlines about certification, very clearly laid out, when the electoral college votes and

right into january 6th. if one of the counties chooses not to meet the deadline for certification, very unclear what the law, the law was rewritten to firm things up, to make it harder to short-circuit an election. there are loopholes, new wrinkles including harder deadlines we don't know what happens if you missed the deadlines. there's a lot of fear in the community that the whole thing could be turned to congress, who knows to >> to be clear, not to spell it out too bluntly, if a county gum soft acidification, refuses a court order, ties it up in litigation, missing that deadline, conceivably, a state misses its deadline to certify the election results because they can't get certified results from every one of their counties. the way that your piece ends is with an acknowledgment from the cochair of the republican national committee, refusing to commit when asked whether or not the rnc, whether or not the

republican party will try to block certification of the results in any states this fall. the rnc is essentially refusing to say whether they are joined in this effort raising the prospect that they are, if a state does not have any certified election results, presumably that means they don't submit electoral slate, electoral college cannot be tallied. >> that is true, the rnc, the chairman himself, other people i've spoken to, they are at best aligning it, not coming out to say we do not believe it should happen. there are a couple legal cases where republican conservative groups are challenging the whole idea of how it is supposed to work, saying that board member should be able to vote their conscience and maybe vote against certification. again, the laws very clearly say you vote for certification, it is a ministerial thing. they are trying to redefine and the rnc is not disavowing it. nobody in this hall today think

that will require to do this in the fall. we all know it will be offhand, a close election in this country so we will see. day let me ask you one last question, outlining this where you have, one of the things that is interesting, it is sort of happening in full view. you talk about 20 different jurisdictions for low-level republican officials already refusing certification, not in places where there is real scandal or worrisome content of the election results, seemingly because they are inclined not to certify anymore. if we can see this happening, he was a reporter can see this happening, the democratic national committee and democratic party can see this happening. are you seeing any evidence of counter effort or counteroffensive on the side of the democrats to try to head this off? >> we are told there's a very strong counter effort, the democrats say, unprecedented,

we hate using that word in my newspaper, only use it when it is true to the democrats say there is unprecedented effort to meet the challenge, get on the ground in these states and monitor. the fact that the washoe county board, tiny commission board, tiny group came to support a republican on the board who is very traditional republican who believes in the certification process. interestingly, she ended up voting against her own certification under immense pressure but reversed her vote this week and that is how that went through. the democrats are all over this and no matter what is going to happen with that campaign, their lawyers are engaged dealing with it and so are many civil rights lawyers. whose goal is not partisan, it is a civil rights issue and they are involved as well. >> wow, this should not be the way elections are fought. this is very first early clearview this is the way this one will be fought, not just about votes. it is about the way elections work or don't do jim rutenberg, writer at large for the new york times magazine. thank you for covering this with such rigor and clarity. it is really good to have you here. >> thanks for having me.

>> we are seeing on the screen, eric trump. it is one of the sons of donald trump, sitting with one of his very young relatives on his knee with his running mate at his side. the whole trump family in appearance, sitting with former president including members of the family we have not seen during the political season. we will take a quick break and come back on the other side. we are expecting donald trump's presidential acceptance speech not long on the fourth night of the republican national convention in milwaukee, wisconsin. ho spell relief? r-o-l-a-i-d-s rolaids' dual-active formula begins to neutralize acid on contact. r-o-l-a-i-d-s spells relief. an alternative to pills, voltaren is a clinically proven arthritis pain relief gel, which penetrates deep to

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welcome back to our special coverage of the fourth and final night of the republican national convention in milwaukee. our own nbc news correspondent jacob soboroff is on the floor with, i believe, the wisconsin delegation. jacob, have we got to? >> reporter: you are correct and i want to say we got the first excerpts from former president trump speech. he will mention the assassination attempt. he will not speak about it again. he will go on to talk about a series of crises in this country. i do want to introduce you to barbara, who i met a few minutes ago. actually, rachel, you will get

a kick out of this. i told her to text her friends that on msnbc you will be on. tell her what you said. >> i have a lot of democratic friends who will be watching. >> reporter: you said that here in wisconsin, politics may not be as divided or we may have more in common than people might think. why do you say that at such a time when people think that it is a really polarized country as we await former president trump excepting the nomination? >> because politics are a small portion of our life. human beings on the ground really do care about each other and we want the same basic things. we are a unified people, but we allow politicians and other people to try to divide us. we have to remember that we are human beings and we need to love one another regardless of our politics and focus on the good in people. >> reporter: i think it is a really nice message. let me ask you briefly, what

brings you here? why are you here in support of the president? >> i'm here because i see the decline in our country. i'm not happy with the policies in place under this administration. i don't dislike joe biden, but i dislike his policies and i want a brighter future for our children. i want to see our seniors be able to afford our prescription drugs and not have to eat cat food and i want to see our young families be able to afford homes and start new families and have a good life and a good education for them. >> reporter: thank you very much and thank you for the work you do on behalf of our seniors. i really appreciate it. rachel, i want to say also that i had a chance briefly to speak with former president trump as he walked out on his way to deliver the speech earlier tonight before he came back to the box. i asked how he is feeling and he said he is feeling good. it is the first time i've seen him that close since the assassination attempt. he gave the double thumbs up and we will be hearing from him

in a minute. >> it is hard to have a vitriolic conversation with g on your head. it is the way we are built. thank you, appreciate it. we will take another quick break here. when we come back, a look at sort of the dog that did not bark, the cheese curds that did not squeak. the single biggest omission from the one thing that republicans always talk about at their conventions. always, always. it is as big a feature at their conventions as the nominee. completely absent from this year's convention. we have that story next as we get closer to former president trump's acceptance speech. stay with us. we will be back.

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we are looking at a live shot of the republican national convention. the venue in milwaukee, wisconsin. tonight is the night that donald trump will accept formally his party's nomination as president of the united states. 1976, a very conservative former governor of california decided to challenge the sitting president in the republican party. it was ronald reagan.

he ran a kind of right-wing insurgent campaign against the sitting president, republican president gerald ford. it did not go well at first. reagan lost the first five primaries. if he was going to have a shot at it he was going to need some help to change things up. enter north carolina's new republican senator, jesse helms. jesse helms took charge of reagan's local campaign. refashioned reagan's message in north carolina to lean into culture war issues the way jesse helms wanted to. most especially he chose the issue of abortion. the supreme court had made abortion legal. they recognized the constitutional right three years earlier in roe v. wade in 1973. well, under jesse helms's leadership, reagan turned his primary campaign around. it was a stunning upset. he proceeded to win primaries across the south with this

newly honed message. reagan ultimately came very close to winning enough delegates to potentially win the presidential nomination that year. he got a lot of delegates. at the 1976 republican national convention in missouri his big elliott hall from the primaries meant he had tons of his own supporters on the committee drawing up that years republican party platform. jesse helms and his allies were clear what they wanted from that platform. they wanted a plank explicitly opposing legal abortion in this country. president ford barely had enough delegates to secure the nomination. he was in no position to argue, so they got it. that weirdly specific story is how the republican party officially became the antiabortion party. the party that would of course nominate reagan himself for president four years later and win. the party that would make opposition to legal abortion central to its identity and

central to its national conventions every four years. if you remember anything, pick a convention. 1992, rnc. you don't remember president george h.w. bush getting nominated for reelection. you remember the firebreathing culture war speech from his primary opponent, pat buchanan, roaring about fighting abortion on demand and fighting abortion is what republican national conventions are all about. every single one. every four years for decades this is been true. the fight against legal abortion, the fight against roe v. wade has been as much a character at every nomination. donald trump was the president that finally did it. he said he would overturn roe v. wade and he did. he appointed three hard-line antiabortion supreme court justices who wasted no time. in fact, in overturning roe versus wade. abortion is now banned or

extremely restricted in more than half the states in the union. the republican party accomplished what they have been trying to do for 50 years and at their convention this week, no mention of abortion. we have heard lots and lots of other things talked about at this convention. we have had aged former wrestlers rip off their clothes. without all kinds of things happen. no mention of abortion whatsoever. it is gone, totally missing. that is how toxic they think this issue is for them now that they have achieved their number one goal of 50 years. they are pretending that it never happened. that said it is still looming as large as ever. because it is the realpolitik of what people are living through in this country, but also because trump picked a running mate who wants a national abortion ban in all 50 states, no exceptions. he is sitting next to speaker mike johnson who says he wants

a national, 50 state abortion ban, no exception. i feel like it is the dog that didn't bark for these republicans at this convention. >> when i was working in the senate in the 1990s, what you saw the abortion issue doing was kind of exactly what each party needed it to do. you couldn't imagine the republican party without it. there was just no way they could come close to winning a national vote without it. they needed that piece in their coalition. but you know that they never, ever wanted it to go away. that is what i thought on my side of it. i didn't think george bush wanted it to go away, because then what do you do? how do you campaign on it the way they campaign on it? i never dreamed reagan wanted it to go away or hw bush wanted it to go away and the democrats were using it against them and both sides were using it for

enormous fundraising. enormous fundraising. it just seemed like a status quo that in party dynamics served both parties and what the democratic party was simply saying was preserve roe versus wade so they would literally when every day it was preserved. the republican party was saying get rid of it, but if they got rid of it then what happens? now you see what happens. they get rid of it and the guy who got rid of it is a frame of -- is afraid of talking about it. >> one thing i note is that i think it is really important to understand about this issue how sincerely and zealous the people fighting for it believe it. >> on both sides. >> no, but particularly people who want to ban abortion nationwide. they could've looked at this and said maybe mifepristone is like a 70-30 issue.

they went after mifepristone. they looked at florida and florida does not want a six week ban. again, they did it. they are going to keep doing it everywhere they can, because they genuinely believe in it. there is a political class that likes having the issue and is looking at this like what are we going to do, but the core grassroots in the republican party believes in the project and will pursue it to the ends of the earth whenever they are in power, full stop. >> the differences that part of the activist community was never in the room. the people who support bands that eliminate exceptions in the life of the mother, that is a 7% issue. that is unpopular among 90% of all americans. the people who support bands with exceptions are 90% opposed. so the people with those issues were never at the table. they were never, even when both sides had this tension, those people were never in the room.

they now run the trump republican party. >> i have to say i never once believed a single republican elected official believed what they were saying with this and every one of their daughters who might get pregnant at age 14, everyone of them would do whatever was necessary to take care of that. john mccain was the only one who did not understand the correct language of this you are supposed to use and his campaign when he was asked what would happen if she got pregnant, she was 13 years old or something at the time and he said we would have to have a family meeting about it and figure out what to do. within 24 hours he had to change that. of course the result of the meeting was we would figure out how to take care of the baby, but the first answer was correct. of course i don't mean the stuff that i say applies to me or my daughter. i don't think there was a single federal elected official in washington certainly when i

was there who ever, ever would have applied that to their own daughters. >> by the way, donald trump doesn't believe it either. what he has done as he opened up the party, he handed the party over to them. i remember the liberty counsel back in 2004, when i was not in the media and doing other stuff for freelancing. i remember interviewing him for an article i was looking to write and he said we are going to support the republican party for now, but there is going to come a time when we are going to expect them to go through with this and fulfill their promises to us and for now we are with george w. bush, but if we don't get what we want, at a certain point we are going to withdraw our support. so the activists very much, they don't care if it is a 90% negative issue. they wanted it badly then. to your point, the person on the ballot, george w. bush, was

at least politically savvy to know this isn't something we want. now they caught it and they have to actually deal with the ramifications for it in this real, electoral process and it is devastating. >> i would say the one thing that is interesting about this from the democratic party and how they message and do politics around this. here is melania trump, the former first lady. we were noting earlier she has not been seen with her husband in any circumstances at political events for a very, very long time, since they left the white house. so it is very unusual that she is here for this event. this entrance in the hall, obviously a real moment for the trump family and the rnc. the dynamic you are describing means that democrats when they talk about abortion rights just need to talk about what happens when republicans get power. it's not personal. it is not about an individual republican politician, an

individual stands they will make an issue out of. i'm sorry, it is the republican controlled supreme court in alabama. they will be in ivf. the legislature in idaho, they will try to ban birth control. anyplace that republicans have power, the republican party will go after abortion the easiest way and then they will do the hard ways and then they will go after fertility and go after birth control. they are after all of it and that is what the republican project is. >> and the sort of line, mike johnson got asked to this at the events today. we give it back to the states. it is obviously a preposterous set of propositions to say we think child murder is fine -- that is obviously not true and people think that first is pretending and i think for politicians a lot of it is, but there are millions of people who believe that and they will spend every seconds of their

lives to stamp it out everywhere, fully, and the only thing that would stop them is some definitive political defeat. that is all. >> by the way, this was set on the debate stage during the republican primaries. i can't remember which candidate said it, but you can't say it is fine to murder babies in california, but not mississippi. this has been since i was in high school. they don't just believe abortion is wrong. birth control, they want to get rid of that. in states like mississippi they want to pursue women outside the state of mississippi. they want to track women's pregnancies. they tried to float in the state of florida that they would get girls. it's tracked in high school. like they want to be able to constantly track women and pursue them around the country, because this is an ideological belief. they think that they are heroic, but they think they are the hero in the form of slavery. they compare to dred scott and they are clear they don't care.

>> j.d. vance is right there. he said abortion is akin to slavery and he has signed on to those efforts to allow attorneys general, to allow prosecutors to get women's medical records to follow them out of state. >> a serious antiabortion vote, and i know some of those people who firmly believe abortion is murder, they are not lying. they are not like the politicians. they had a candidate in this republican primary and his name was mike pence. they had a candidate and i mistakenly believed that enough of those people, as voters, would take their belief into the primary and mike pence was going to cause a problem for donald trump even if donald trump was not at the debates, because mike pence was going to show you the crack, the opening between him and donald trump on this issue and he did and no one cared. they did not care.

>> msnbc anchor stephanie ruhle is on the floor at the rnc in milwaukee this evening. i have no idea where. where are you standing? >> reporter: right now i'm standing between south dakota and wyoming. rachel, it is almost a night not to be believed. all week long we keep hearing about how things will be toned down and the temperature will be toned down and unity and then hulk hogan took the stage talking about criminals and scumbags and they are going to get it followed by franklin graham. and moments ago you mentioned it. it was almost like a disney on ice experience, former first lady melania trump made her way in. i left out eric trump speaking. what is important about eric trump's speech, because he really got this room fired up. he was talking about the cost of living and inflation and while he rattled off a lot of numbers where life is expensive, whether it is how much groceries cost or your mortgage costs, what he left out

was context that when donald trump left office covid was rampant. he never actually talked to operation warp speed, which could be a crowning jewel in the fact that is when the vaccine was developed. in the new world of trump, vaccine is not a positive word. the word again tonight was unity, with a question mark. people are fired up and they have a chance to speak. we hear fight, fight, fight. the person who got this crowd the most fired up tonight was tucker carlson, giving them all of the red meat. now trump being the showman that he is, the anticipation is rising and we are watching a video that is basically the story of a boy from new york. in the video he has an old- school picture of our own al sharpton. he is trying to tell sort of the boy from new york story and obviously in this room, they are buying it. >> let me ask you, being in the room, the overall atmosphere as

we saw, not particularly full. sometimes raucous, sometimes more crowded, sometimes less venue over the course of the week. i have to imagine it is packed to the rafters now since we are about to get trump's speech. >> reporter: this is the night they are fired up. they were excited before j.d. vance, but there was a lackluster response. j.d. vance compared to tucker carlson, this place went off for talk or -- for tucker carlson. now they are jazzed up, they have their cowboy hats on, they have every sign imaginable and they are waiting for him to take the stage. when melania came in they have this thing designed, produced very much like a royal event and certainly when she came and it was as though she was the queen of the night and there is no one talking about the fact we have not seen her in any political arena for months and months. donald trump is a showman and this is a show. >> stephanie ruhle in milwaukee,

we will be back with you a little later on. we will squeeze in our last quick break before the former president makes his acceptance speech. i have seen excerpts. you might want to get a glass of water. snack time now. we will be right back. if you're living with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis or active psoriatic arthritis, symptoms can sometimes take you out of the moment. now there's skyrizi, so you can show up with clearer skin and show it off. (♪♪) with skyrizi, you could take each step with 90% clearer skin. and if you have psoriatic arthritis skyrizi can help you get moving with less joint pain, stiffness, swelling, and fatigue. and skyrizi, is just 4 doses a year, after 2 starter doses. serious allergic reactions and an increased risk of infections or a lower ability to fight them may occur.

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welcome back to the republican national convention. that is kid rock. they are actually doing it. >> people in the room don't have any idea who that is. b mackey is like a maga celebrity, right? >> welcome back tonight four of the republican national convention in milwaukee, wisconsin. that was the end of, i won't call them remarks, but an experience. kid. is it? is it like first name kid? here's the thing, is it kid rock, like my name is first name, last name, or is he saying his name -- we will sort

all of this out. >> i think he was rehearsing when i was on the air from 4:00 to 6:00 and it was loud, so they got the benefit of his performance. rehearsing earlier in the day with sound checks and everything. i'm sure it was great. >> we have excerpts. we have the speech. we have excerpts from donald trump's speech. i've seen a little bit of it, i have not seen much. alex, you've been going through it. >> i will say that the excerpts we can report on, trump is saying the things that he believes he should be saying about unity. we are more determined than ever. he talks about being president for all of america, not half of america, because there is no victory in winning for half of america. mathematically, that is mathematically true. rhetorically i question, listen,

i don't think it is a bad thing that trump is taking a position that unity is a good thing for the country. so we don't want to besmirch that instinct, but at the same time i can't get past the fact that this is a spectacle, an event where you have people holding up mass deportation signs now. mass deportation now signs, where you have a vice president who has been on tape announcing he believes there should be a national abortion band so women don't cross state lines to exercise bodily autonomy. there is this hats off to the working class while the washington post is reporting wall street titans are in the audience. i just think the hypocrisy around a lot of different themes that are being proposed at this convention is pretty staggering and deserves, you know, some focus, given what

the president is going to say tonight. i would also say, rachel, to your point about abortion, you know, this is really 40 years of conservative thinking and strategy coming home to roost. for so long the conservative movement has wanted to reinforce the primacy of the christian family and everything that is a threat to it needs to be extinguished. whether that is abortion, reproductive choice. whether that is gay marriage that threatens the christian heteronormative nuclear family. whether that is affirmative action that champions nonwhite, potentially non-christian voices. this is really something in terms of an achievement of the right wing and the new right under reagan and now under leaders like j.d. vance has been working towards for decades. >> donald trump saying there is no victory in just half of the

country. less than half of the country voted for him last time and he got the electoral college. the same thing with george w. bush in his first when and if we lived in a democracy, this is a thought exercise for the way we live in this country and how it is not a democracy. if we lived in a democracy where the candidate who gets the most votes wins the election, there would be one republican on the supreme court, clarence thomas. that is what your country would be if the person who gets the most votes won the election. al gore would have been president. he would not have had alito. he would not have john roberts. donald trump would not be president. the idea of, you know, this talk about how can this country be so divided? well, when you take candidates who come in second, make them president, give them the power

to appoint kings on the supreme court, for life on the supreme court. when really what you have earned through electoral power through the supreme court, what you have earned through the votes of the people is exactly one justice, clarence thomas. that is the only one who was put down there by someone who got to the presidency by winning the most votes. >> tucker carlson in his speech tonight said real democracy is what donald trump represents because he is giving the people what they want and that is what he represents. that he actually is the one giving the people what they want. tucker carlson and donald trump's views are minority views. so they have decided that the people who want what they want, a national abortion ban, christian nationalism, those are the people and everyone else's non-people. it doesn't matter what everyone else wants, because whatever donald trump says the people want is what they want and that

is democracy. >> what is interesting, i will not be the first person to note this, but donald trump having lived the way he has lived and having had the tabloid lifestyle he reveled in for so long and is so much a part of what his public persona is, to have him be a vehicle for a movement that really has brought about abortion bands. that wants to get rid of no- fault divorce. that wants to ban contraception. contraception is birth control. wants to ban birth control. had us -- has already tried to ban fertility treatments. to have those things right him to power. to have him be the vehicle for those sorts of transformative things in american life and culture is really, this is the second time i've said this in two days, but it really is shakespearean.

>> melania could not be there without no-fault divorce, because he keeps divorcing women to marry different women. he is sitting with the children of his first wife, who he divorce to mary his second wife and tiffany, that daughter is sitting there. then he divorced her and married melania. no divorce would have made his lifestyle impossible. the reality is he has become the rest of the other things in the speech and the things we know of it. he is the leader of a religious movement. it is fundamentally a far right- wing version of christianity that has been reformed around him. he is the godhead in this religion. he is the golden calf they are worshiping in that room and party. >> and he is the least religious person -- >> he doesn't go to church. >> or the democratic party. the part of it that brings back the role, the complicity of the republican party is they all

know this also. january 6 happens because mitch mcconnell and kevin mccarthy say let them cry it out. we know he lost, but let him cry it out. so he cries it out and there is the end of the american transition of the peaceful transfer of power. we can't say that to anyone anymore that we are the country of peaceful transfer of power. they ended that. mitch mcconnell and kevin mccarthy did that. mitch mcconnell, could be one person, right? mitch mcconnell refers trump criminally, but because of mitch mcconnell's role in manipulating the makeup of the supreme court, what mitch mcconnell thought should happen to donald trump for january 6 will not happen to donald trump or anyone else. for a president for criminal prosecution ever again because of what mitch mcconnell did to the united states supreme court. kevin mccarthy is getting punked every day at the convention by matt gaetz. don't get between mccarthy and a camera because he wants to tell anyone listening that matt gaetz did terrible things, had

sex with an underage girl and should be prosecuted. doj looked at that case and it did not happen. that is because bill barr was there. it is a case merrick garland inherited and who knows why it wasn't brought, but everything that has come to pass is also the fault or primarily the fault of the republican party. >> there is donald trump walking out on stage. to accept the nomination of the republican party for president for the third time. donald trump is only the second president in american history to lose a reelection bid and win his party's nomination again four years later. the last was grover cleveland. he did not have the same stage set up. trump is the only party nominee in u.s. history to be a convicted felon, found guilty on 34 felony counts weeks ago. he will accept his party's nomination with a bandage on his ear, covering a wound from an assassination attempt a few

days ago and of course trump has fundamentally changed the republican party, turning it effectively into a cult of personality around himself. for the last eight years pretty much every republican has become a trump acolyte or has been banished from the party. as he takes the stage tonight at the 2024 republican national convention, this is 100% his party. you see the firefighter gear there. that reportedly belongs to the volunteer firefighter who was killed at the trump rally on saturday night. the butler, pennsylvania rally this weekend. he was trying to shield his family from the bullets. he was 50 years old and leaves a wife and two daughters. his jacket and helmet will remain on stage for the duration of trump's acceptance speech. let's watch.

>> thank you very much. thank you very, very much. wow. and thank you, dana. thank you, kid rock. sometimes referred to as bob. and thank you, lee, right from the beginning. what a talent. what a beautiful, beautiful song. thank you. friends, delegates and fellow citizens, i stand before you this evening with a message of

confidence, strength, and hope. four months from now we will have an incredible victory and we will begin the four greatest years in the history of our country. together we will 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. 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.

so tonight with faith and devotion i proudly accept your nomination for president of the united states. thank you. thank you very much. >> trump, trump, trump! >> thank you very much. and we will do it right. we will do it right. 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. 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, tell us what happened, please. and therefore i will tell you exactly what happened and you will never hear it from me a second time, because it is actually too painful to tell. it was a warm, beautiful day in the early evening in butler township in the great commonwealth of pennsylvania. music was loudly playing and

the campaign was doing really well. i went to the stage and the crowd was cheering wildly. everybody was happy. i began speaking very strongly, powerfully, and happily. because i was discussing the great job my administration did on immigration at the southern border. we were very proud of it. behind me, and to the right, was a large screen that was displaying a chart of border crossings under my leadership. the numbers were absolutely amazing. in order to see the chart, i started to, like this, turn to my right and was ready to begin

a little bit further turn, which i am very lucky i didn't do. 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. and moved my right hand to my ear. brought it down. my hand was covered with blood, absolutely blood all over the place. i immediately knew it was very serious that we were under attack and in one movement proceeded to drop to the ground. bullets were continuing to fly as very brave secret service agents rushed to the stage and they really did, they rushed to

the stage. these are great people. at great risk, i will tell you. and pounced on top of me, so that i would be protected. there was blood pouring everywhere and yet in a certain way i felt very safe, because i had god on my side. i felt that. the amazing thing is that prior to the shot, if i had not moved my head at that very last instant, the assassin's bullet would have perfectly hit its mark.

and i would not be here tonight. we would not be here together. the most incredible aspect of what took place on that terrible evening, in the fading son, was actually seen later. in almost all cases as you probably know, when even a single bullet is fired, just a single bullet, and we had many bullets that were being fired. crowds run for the exits or stampede. but not in this case. it was very unusual. this massive crowd of tens of thousands of people stood by and did not move an inch. in fact many of them bravely but automatically stood up looking for where the sniper would be. they knew immediately it was a sniper and then began pointing at him. you can see that if you look at the group behind me.

that was just a small group compared to what was in front. nobody ran and by not stampeding, many lives were saved. but that isn't the reason. that they didn't move. the reason is that they knew i was in very serious trouble. they saw me go down. they saw the blood and thought, actually, most did, that i was dead. they knew it was a shot to the head. they saw the blood. there is an interesting statistic. the ears are the bloodiest part. if something happens to the ears, they bleed more than any other part of the body, for whatever reason. the doctors told me that. i said why is there so much blood and they said it is the ears, they bleed more. so we learned something.

they just, this beautiful crowd, they didn't want to leave me. they knew i was in trouble. they didn't want to leave me and you could see that love written all over their faces. incredible people. they are incredible people. bullets were flying over us, yet i felt serene. now the secret service agents were putting themselves in peril. they were in very dangerous territory. bullets were flying right over them, missing them by a very small amount of inches and then it all stopped. our secret service sniper, from a much greater distance, and with only one bullet used, took the assassin's life. took him out. i am not supposed to be here tonight. i'm not supposed to be here.

>> yes you are! yes you are! yes you are! >> thank you. but i'm not. and i will tell you, i stand before you in this arena only by the grace of almighty god. in watching the reports over the last few days, many people say it was a providential moment. probably was. when i rose, surrounded by secret service, the crowd was confused because they thought i was dead and there was great,

great sorrow. i could see that on their faces as i looked out. they didn't know i was looking out, they thought it was over. but i could see it and i wanted to do something to let them know i was okay. i raised my right arm, looked at the thousands and thousands of people that were breathlessly waiting and started shouting, fight, fight, fight. thank you. once my clenched fist went up and it was high into the air, you all see that. the crowd realized i was okay and roared with pride for our country, like no crowd i have ever heard before.

never heard anything like it. for the rest of my life i will be great all -- grateful for the love shown by that audience and patriots that stood bravely on that fateful evening in pennsylvania. tragically the shooter claimed the life of one of our hello americans, corey comperatore. unbelievable person, everybody tells me. unbelievable. and seriously wounded two other great warriors. i spoke to them today. david dutch and james copenhaver, great people. i also spoke to all three families of these tremendous people. our love and prayers are with them and always will be.

they came for a great rally. they were serious, i want to tell you. and still are. but unfortunately we have to use the past tense. he was a highly respected former fire chief. respected by everybody. he was accompanied by his wife, helen. an incredible woman i spoke with today. and two precious daughters. he lost his life selflessly acting as a human shield to protect them from flying bullets. he went right over the top of them and was hit. what a fine man he was.

i want to thank the fire department and the family for sending his helmet. his outfit. and it was just something. they are going to do something very special when they get it, but we did something which cannot match what happened, not even close. but i am very proud to say over the past few days we raised $6.3 million. for the families of david,

james, and corey, including from a friend of mine. sent me a check. right here. just got it. $1 million. from dan newlin, thank you, dan. and again when speaking to the family i told them, well, i'm going to be sending you a lot of money but it can't compensate. they all said the same thing. you're right, sir. we appreciate what you are doing, but nothing can take the place of corey and the other two. by the way they were very seriously injured, but now they are doing very well. they are going to be okay. they are doing better. they are warriors. so now i ask that we observe a moment of silence in honor of

our friend, corey. there is no greater love than to lay down one's life for others. this is the spirit that forged america in her darkest hours and this is the love that will lead america back to the summit of human achievement and greatness. this is what we need. despite such a heinous attack, we unite this evening more determined than ever. i am more determined than ever and so are you, so was everybody else. thank you. thank you very much.

our resolve is unbroken and our purpose is unchanged, to deliver a government that serves the american people better than ever before. nothing will stop me in this mission, because our vision is righteous and our cause is. -- our cause is pure. we will not break, we will not bend, we will not back down and i will never stop fighting for you, your family and our magnificent country. magnificent country. >> and everything i have to give , with all of the energy and fight in my heart and soul, i pledge to our nation tonight.

thank you very much. i pledge that to our nation. and to turn our nation around. and we are going to do it very quickly, thank you. this election should be about the issues facing our country, and how to make america successful, safe, free, and great again. in an age when our politics too often divide us, now is the time to remember that we are all fellow citizens. we are one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. and we must not criminalize dissent, or demonize political disagreement, which is what is been happening in our country

lately, at a level that nobody has ever seen her. in that spirit, the democrat party should immediately stop weatherizing the justice system and labeling their political opponent as an enemy of democracy. especially since that is not true. in fact, i am the one saving democracy for the people of our country. and very big news, as you probably just read, on monday a major ruling was handed down from a highly respected federal judge in florida, aileen cannon , finding that the prosecutor and the fake documents case against me were totally unconstitutional, and the entire case was thrown out

of court. with all of that publicity thrown out of court. if democrats want to unify our country, they should drop these partisan witchhunts, which i have been going through for approximately eight years. and they should do that without delay, and allow an election to proceed that is worthy of our people. we are going to win it anyway. worthy of our people. on this journey i am deeply honored to be joined by my amazing wife, melania .

and melania , thank you very much. you also did something really beautiful, a letter to america calling for national unity, and it really took the republican party by surprise. i will tell you, it was beautiful. in fact, some very serious people said that we should take that letter and put it as part of the republican platform. that would be an honor, wouldn't it? right? mr. congressman? but it captivated so many, so i also want to thank my entire family for being here. don, kimberly, ivanka, tiffany,

michael, baron . and of course, my 10 wonderful grandchildren, you saw a few of them up there on my lap before. and how good was dana? you know, he was on probably the only vacation he has had, maybe ever. because he works. it's been about 10 years with his wife, very far away. i won't tell you where, but very faraway, beautiful place. and my people called and he said yeah, i will be able to do it. this is many, many years. i promise my wife, i can't do it. and they came in and they said dana will be able to do it. because he was my first, second, and third choice. i said well, you know, that's too bad. but i understand he is away,

and that's good. it's good for him. about 30 minutes later she came back in, sir, dana just called, he's going to do it. and his wife, she said you can't turn them down, you just can't do it. you have to go. that's a good wife. so, he got on a plane. he got here a little while ago, now he is going to get on the plane and a little while and he will go back home to his wife. but they are great, and i just want to thank her and him, and their whole family. because that's not easy. and kid rock, same thing. he called, he said i want to be a part of it. i want to be a part of it. because you know, kid does this great song, big, big monster song. i had no idea. he became a friend of mine over the last 10 years, and he is amazing. everyone loves him.

i didn't even know how big he was. you know, he has rallies? 35, 40,000 people he gets every time he goes out. i think he is making so much money he doesn't know what the hell to do with it. and then we have my other friend, and i have known him so long, and we took that song, and it was a big success. we made that. i saw a chart of great songs to america, that was number one on the chart recently, number one. that is lee greenwood, very special, beautiful person. he's a beautiful man. but they all wanted to be here. they called. and how about hulk, is he up here? where is he. boy, oh boy. you know, they may call that entertainment. i know about entertainment. but when he used to lift a 350

pound man over his shoulders and then benchpress them two rows into the audience, i said it may be entertainment, that he is one strong a son of a gun. i watched it many times. there are not a lot of entertainers that could do that, right? you are fantastic, thank you very much. followed by eric. what was that all about? that was good. i didn't really want to come appear. he was so great, and he is such a good young man. he went through a lot of trouble, and don, last night, was incredible. they got subpoenaed more than any people probably in the history of the united states. every week they get another subpoena from the democrats, crazy nancy pelosi, the whole thing. just boom, boom, boom. they've got to stop that,

because they are destroying our country. we have to work on making america great again, not on beating people. we won, we beat them in all, we beat them on the impeachments, we beat them on indictments. but the time you have to spend, if they would devote that genius to helping our country, we would have a much stronger and better country. and jason, the biggest star in country music, jason, thank you for being here. jason, thank you very much, jason aldean. he is good. i like his wife even better, by the way. she is here. thank you, jason. but i am thrilled to have a new friend and partner fighting by my side, the next vice

president of the united states, the current senator from ohio, jd vance and his incredible wife , usha . he is going to be a great vice president. he's going to be great. he will be with this country, and the greatest movement in the history of our country, make america great again. when they criticized it, they said we are going to try to stop maga . i said maga is make america great again. what are you going to stop? and they said oh, that's right. it's very tough to fight it. and all the people that did try to fight it have failed. he is going be with us for a long time, and it was an honor to select him.

great, great student at yale. his wife was a great student at yale. they met at yale. these are two smart people. so, jb, you are going to be doing this for a long time. enjoy the ride. and a very special thank you to the extraordinary people of milwaukee, and the great state, oh, there they are. there they are. you are is so easy to spot. and green bay is going to have a good team this year, right? they're going to have a good team. they're going to have a good team. most of the audience doesn't like it, but it's true. you will have a very good team, you'll see. and, by the way, wisconsin, we are spending over $250 million here creating jobs and other

economic development all over the place, so i hope you will remember this in november, and give us your vote. i am trying to buy your vote. i will be honest about that. and i promise we will make wisconsin great again. thank you. mr. governor, thank you very much. thank you. i am here tonight to lay out a vision for the whole nation, to every citizen, whether you are a young or old man, or woman. democrat, republican, or independent. black or white. asian or hispanic. i extend to you a hand of loyalty and of friendship. together we will lead america to new heights of greatness, like the world has never seen before. we were right there in the first term. we got hit with

covid, we did a great job. nobody knew what it was, nobody has ever seen an economy pre- covid. then we handed over a stock market that was substantially higher than just prior to covid. coming in, did a great job, never got credit for that. we got credit for the war and defeating isis, and so many things, the great economy, the biggest tax cuts ever, the biggest regulation cuts ever. the creation of space force, the rebuilding of our military, we did so much. we did so much. rights to try, right to try is a big deal. we've got right to try. they were trying to get that for 52 years. somebody who is terminally ill, and hopefully there is nobody in this audience, but it does happen a lot, they are terminally ill and they cannot use our new space-age drugs and other things. we are way ahead, we have the greatest doctors in the world. the greatest laboratories in the world. and you can do it.

they've been trying to get that approved for 52 years. it wasn't that easy. the insurance companies didn't want to do it, they didn't want to risk. labs didn't want to do it, because if it didn't work, people are pretty far down the line towards death, they didn't want to do it. the doctors didn't want to have it on their records. it's like everybody in office. 52 years they tried. it sounds simple, but it is not. and i got them to agree that somebody that needs it will, instead of going to asia, europe, or someplace, or if you have no money, going home and dying, just dying. we got them to sign an agreement, they agreed to it, where they are not going to sue anybody. they're going to get all of this stuff, they're going to get really fast. and what has happened is we are saving thousands on thousands of lives. it is incredible. right to try. that is a great feeling. under her leadership the united states will be respected again. no nation will question our power, no enemy will doubt our might. our borders will be totally secure, our economy will soar.

we will return law in 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. we have totally incompetent leadership. this will be the most important election in the history of our country, under the current administration we are, indeed, a nation in decline. we have an inflation crisis that is making life unaffordable , ravaging the incomes of working and low income families, and crushing, just simply crushing our people like never before. they've never seen anything like it. we also have an illegal immigration crisis, and it is taking place right now, as we sit here in this beautiful arena

. it is a massive invasion at our southern border that has spread misery, crime, poverty, disease, and destruction to communities all across our land. no one has ever seen anything like it. then there is an international crisis, the likes of which the world has seldom been part of. nobody can believe what is happening. war is now raging in europe, and the middle east. a growing specter of conflict hangs over taiwan, korea, the philippines, and all of asia. and our planet is teetering on the edge of world war iii. this will be a war like no other war, because of weaponry. the weapons are no longer army tanks going back and forth, shooting at each other. these weapons are obliteration. it is time for a change, this administration can't come close to solving the problems. we are dealing with very tough, very fierce people. they are fierce people.

and we don't have fierce people. we have people that are a lot less than fierce, except when it comes to cheating on elections, on a couple of other things, then they are fierce. then they are fierce. so, tonight i make this pledge to the great people of america. i will end the devastating inflation crisis immediately, bring down interest rates, and lower the cost of energy. we will drill, baby, drill.

can you believe what they are doing? but by doing that, they will lead a large-scale decline in prices. prices will start to come down. energy raised it, they took our energy policies and destroyed them. then they immediately went back to them, but by that time so much was lost. but we will do it at levels that nobody has ever seen before, and we will end lots of different things. we will start paying off debt and start lowering taxes even further. we give you the largest tax cut. we will do it more. people don't realize i brought taxes way down, way way down. and yet, we took in more revenues the following year than we did with the tax rate was much higher. most people said how did you do that? because it was incentive. everybody was coming to the country, they were bringing back billions and billions of dollars into our country. the companies made it possible to bring it back. the tax rate was too high, and

the legal complications were far too great. i changed both of them, and hundreds of billions of dollars by apple in so many other companies i brought back into our nation. and we had an economy the likes of which nobody, no nation had ever seen. china, we were beating them at levels that were incredible. and they know it, they know it. we will do it again, but we will do it even better. i will end the illegal immigration crisis by closing our border and finishing the wall, most of which i have already built. on the wall we were dealing with a very difficult congress, and i said oh, that's okay, we won't go to congress. i call it an invasion. we gave our military almost $800 billion. i said i'm going to take a little of that money, because this is an invasion.

most of the wall was already built, and we build it through using the funds, because what is better than that? we have to stop the invasion into our country that is killing hundreds of thousands of people a year. we are not going to let that happen. i will end every single international crisis that the current administration has created, including the horrible war with russia and ukraine, which would've never happened if i was president. and in the war caused by the attack on israel, which would've never happened if i was president. iran was broke, iran had no money. now iran has $250 billion, they made it all over the last 2 1/2 years. they were broke. i watched the other day on a show called the face the nation, has anyone seen it? they had a congressman who was

a democrat say, well, whether you like it or not, i told china and other countries, if you buy from iran, we will not let you do any business in this country, and we will put tariffs on every product you do send in, of 100% or more. >> and they said well, i think that's about it, they are not going to buy the oil. and they were ready to make a deal, iran was ready to make a deal with us. then we had that horrible, horrible result that will never happen again. the election result, we are never going to let that happen again. they used covid to cheat. we are never going to let it happen again. and they took off all the sanctions and they did everything possible for iran. now iran is very close to having a nuclear weapon, which would've never happened. it is a shame what this administration, the damage that this administration is done. and i say it often.

if you took the 10 worst presidents in the history of the united states, think of it. of the 10 worst, added them up, they will not have done the damage that biden has done. i'm only going to use the term once. i'm not going to use the name anymore, just one time. the damage that he has done to this country is unthinkable. it is unthinkable. together we will restore vision, strength, competence, and we are going to have a thing called common sense making most of our decisions. just a few short years ago under my presidency, we had the most secure border and best economy in the history of our country, in the history of the world. we had the greatest economy in the history of the world. we had never done anything like it. we were beating every country, including china, by leaps and bounds. nobody had seen anything like it. we had no inflation, soaring incomes. nobody can believe it.

you can't believe what happened four years ago is happening now , in reverse. and the world was at peace. inflation has been a killer for our country, no matter what you make it, it does not matter. because inflation is eating you alive. people that were putting away money, they were making great wages, the highest they've ever made. they were putting away love money. now they are just being destroyed. they are not putting away anything. they are barely living. they're going into savings accounts, taking out the money to live because of inflation. inflation, remember, it is called a country buster. you can go back to germany from 100 years ago, you can go back to any country that suffered great inflation. we have suffered the worst inflation we have ever had. but go back and see what is happened to those countries. we have the worst inflation we've ever had under this person. but in less than four years, our opponents have turned incredible success into unparalleled tragedy and

failure. it has been a tremendous failure. today our cities are flooded with illegal aliens. americans are being squeezed out of the labor force, and their jobs are taken. by the way, you know who is taking the jobs? the jobs that are created? 107% of those jobs are taken by illegal aliens. and you know who is being hurt the most by millions of people, pouring into our country? the black population and the hispanic population, because they are taking the jobs from our black population, our hispanic population, and they are also taking them from unions. the unions are suffering because of it. thank you, thank you. i like you, too. thank you very much. inflation has wiped out the life savings of our citizens and forced the middle-class into a state of depression. and despair. that is what it is, it is

despair and depression. we cannot and will not let this continue. less than four years ago we were a great nation, and we will soon be a great nation again. we are going to be a great nation again. thank you. with proper leadership, every disaster we are now enduring will be fixed, and it will be fixed very, very quickly. so, tonight, whether you have supported me in the past or not, i hope you will support me in the future, because i will bring back the american dream. that is what we are going to do. you don't even hear about the american dream anymore. with great humility i am asking you to be excited about the future of our country. be excited. be excited.

and, by the way, the news reports, look at all of those big networks. look at them. they are all here. but every one of them has said this could be the most organized, best run, and most enthusiastic convention of either party that they've ever seen, every single one. and it's true. it's true. when there is love in the room, there is great love in the room. so i'd better finish strong, otherwise we will blow it, and we can't let that happen. now, this was great. all of the great people that spoke, and everybody had a home run. there is not one that i can think of what i said oh, that

wasn't great. every single person. i refuse to be the only one, don't do that to me. they are already getting ready, see, i gave them an idea. now this was a great convention. i think we are going to go home and miss it. first of all, look at these crowds. you would never have this at a convention. look at these crowds. love, it's about love. this week the entire republican party has formally adopted an agenda for america's renewal, and you saw that agenda. it is very short compared to the long, boring, meaningless agendas of the past, including the democrats. they write these things that are hundreds of pages long and they never read them after they are done. in their case, fortunately, they don't read them. because they are pretty bad.

it is a series of bold promises that we will swiftly implement when you give us a republican house, and mr. speaker, thank you very much. we have our great speaker of the house with us tonight, mr. speaker, thank you very much. thank you. a republican senate, we have many senators here. and send me back to our beautiful white house, just a few short months from now. we are talking about just months. it can't come fast enough. we have to get it done. first we must get economic relief to our citizens, starting on day one, we will drive down prices and make america affordable again. we have to make it affordable. it's not affordable. people can't live like this. under this administration, our current administration, groceries are up 57%. gasoline is a 60 and 70%.

mortgage rates have quadrupled. and the fact is, it doesn't matter what they are, because you can't get the money anyway. you can't buy houses. young people can't get any financing to buy a house. the total household costs have increased an average of $28,000 for a family under this administration. republicans have a plan to bring back prices and bring them down very, very rapidly, by slashing energy costs. we will, in turn, reduce the cost of transportation, manufacturing, and all household goods. so much so our swift energy. and remember, we have more liquid gold under our feet than any other country, by far. we are a nation that has the opportunity to make an absolute fortune with its energy. we have it, and china doesn't. under the trump administration, just 3 1/2 years ago, we were

energy independent. but soon we will actually be better than that, we will be energy dominant in supply, not only ourselves, but we will supply the rest of the world. with numbers that nobody has ever seen. and we will reduce our debt, $36 trillion. we will start reducing that, and we will also reduce your taxes still further. next, and by the way, they want to raise your taxes four times. think of it. and all my life i grew up watching politicians. i always loved politics, i guess, i was on the other side. and they were always talking about we will give you a tax cut, we will give you a tax cut. my whole life i was watching i will give you a tax cut, right, mr. congressman? that's all they talked about. this is the only ministration that said we are going to raise your taxes by four times we are paying now, and people are

supposed to vote for them? i've never heard it. you are paying too much. we are going to reduce your taxes still further. we gave you the biggest one, as i said. we are going to give you more, and it's going to lead to tremendous growth. we want growth in our country, that's is going to pay off our debt. and next we will end the ridiculous and actually incredible waste of taxpayer dollars that is fueling the inflation crisis. they have spent trillions of dollars on things having to do with the green new scam. it is a scam. and that has caused tremendous inflationary pressures in addition to the cost of energy. and all of the trillions of dollars that are sitting there, not yet spent, we will redirect that money for important projects like roads, bridges, dams, and we will not allow it to be spent on meaningless green new scam ideas.

and i will end the electric vehicle mandate on day one. thereby saving the u.s. auto industry from complete obliteration, which is happening right now, and saving u.s. customers thousands and thousands of dollars per car. right now, as we speak, large factories just started being built across the border in mexico. with all the other things happening on our border, and there being built by china to make cars and to sell them into our country. the united auto workers ought to be ashamed for allowing this to happen. and the leader of the united auto workers should be fired immediately.

and every single autoworker, union and nonunion, should be voting for donald trump. because we are going to bring back our manufacturing and we are going to bring it back fast. they are building some of the largest auto plants anywhere in the world. think of it. in the world. we are going to bring it back. we are going to make them. we don't mind that happening. but those plants are going to be built in the united states, and our people are going to demand those plants. and if they don't agree with us, we will put a tariff of approximately 100 to 200% on each car, and they will be unsellable in the united states. we have long been taken advantage of by other countries. and think of it, often times these are the countries considered so-called allies. they have taken advantage of us for years. we lose jobs, we lose revenue,

and they gain everything at about our businesses, wipe out our people. i stopped it, for four years i stopped it. and we are really ready to make changes like nobody had seen before. remember, at u.s. mca i got rid of nafta, the worst radial ever made, and replace it with, they say, the best radial ever made. actually, probably the best trade deal was the deal i made with china where they by $50 billion worth of our product. they were buying nothing. they by $50 billion worth, they had to. but i don't even talk about it, because of covid. i don't even mention it, frankly, because of what happened with the china virus. we will not let countries come in, take our jobs, and plunder our nation. they come and do that. they plunder our nation.

the way they will sell their product in america is to build it in america. very simple. bill burton america and only in america. and this very simple formula, and congress has to go along with us, and they will, it is very simple formula to create massive numbers of jobs. we will take over the auto industry again, and many, many hundreds of thousands of jobs. we lost so many jobs over the years. if you go back 20, 25 years, they started going to china next. about 68% of our auto industry manufacturing jobs. we are going to get them all back, we will get them all back, everyone of them. at the center of our plan for economic relief, massive tax cuts for workers that include

something else that started out to be very popular, actually. here it is very popular, in this building, and all those hotels that i saw that are so nice, i am staying in a nice one. it is called no tax on tips. no tax on tips. no tax on it tips. i got that by having dinner recently in nevada, where we are leading by about 14 points. hello. i will see you there very soon, everybody. we were having dinner at a beautiful restaurant, and the trump building on the strip, it's a great building. and the waitress comes over,

how is everything going? really nice person. how is everything going? oh, it is so tough, the government is after me all the time on tips, tips, tips. i said they give you cash, would they be able to find it? and i know this, she said very little cash is given, it is also right on the check. and they come in and they take so much of our money, it is just ridiculous. and they don't believe anything we say. they just hired, as you know, 88,000 agents to go after them even more. and i said this shows the level of my, you know, most people go out, they hire consultants, they pay the millions of dollars. but i said to her, let me just ask a question. would you be happy if you had no tax on tips? she said what a great idea. i got my information from a very smart waitress. that's better than spending millions of dollars. and everybody, everybody loves it. waitresses, caddies, drivers, everybody, a large group of people that are being really

hurt badly. they make money, let them keep their money. i am going to protect social security and medicare, democrats are going to destroy social security. because all of these people, by the millions they're coming in, they're going to be on social security and medicare and other things, and you are not able to afford it. they are destroying your social security and your medicare. under my plan incomes will skyrocket, inflation will vanish completely. jobs will come roaring back, and the middle class will prosper like never, ever before. and we are going to do it very rapidly. but, no hope or dream we have for america can succeed unless we stop the illegal immigrant invasion, the worst it has ever been seen anywhere in the world. there is never been an invasion

like this anywhere, third world countries would fight with sticks and stones not to let this happen. the invasion at our southern border, we will stop it, and we will stop and quickly. you heard todd homan yesterday, put him in charge and just sit back and watch. brandon judd, for border patrol. these guys, really, their job is a lot easier if they don't have to do anything, but they want to. they are patriots. renin judd, border patrol. ice goes out, you have to see what ice does with ms-13. these are probably the worst gang, and ice goes in there. i know a lot of people in these rows here, and they are very tough people. but they don't want to do this job. they will go into a pack of ms- 13 killers, they are the worst, probably the worst gangs in the world. and we have thousands of them. i moved thousands and thousands out in my four years. we moved them out, and it was a pleasure.

but ice would go right into a pack of these killers, and you see fists flying, you see everything flying, and then they take them. they put them in a paddy wagon, they take them back and they get them out of our country. and the other countries weren't accepting them back, and i called up and i said tell them that we are not giving them economic aid anymore. and the next day i got calls from all of these countries that were terminated, billions of dollars we have spent on economic aid to countries that does is, frankly, no good. the next day i was called by everybody, i couldn't take all the calls. sir, sir, what's the problem? i said you will take your killers back that you sent in caravans into america. you won't take them back. well, sir, if you'd like us to, we will give very serious consideration to doing that. and within 24 hours they were being taken back. for years and years, when i first came in, they said resident obama tried to get them to go back and they would not accept them. they put planes on the runway

so you could not leave the plane, they close the road so you cannot take the buses, that often turned back. as soon as i said no more economic aid of any kind to any country that does that, they called back and they said sir, it would be a great honor to take ms-13. we love them very much. we love them very much, sir, we will take them back. at the heart of the republican platform is our pledge to end this border nightmare amma and fully restore the sacred and sovereign borders of the united states of america. and we are going to do that on day one. that means two things on day one, right? drill, baby, drill, and close our borders. and, by the way, and i think everybody as a republican, as a patriot in this room, most democrats, we want people to come into our country, but they

have to come into our country legally. legally. less than four years ago i handed this administration the strongest border in american history. but you can see on the chart that saved my life, that was the chart that saved my life. i said, look at it, i am so proud of it. i think it's one of the greatest, it was done by the border patrol, one of the greatest charts i've ever seen. it showed everything just like that. you know the chart. there it is, it's pretty good. last time i put up that chart it never really got to look at it. but, without that chart, i would not be here today. never got to look at it.

i said it you've got to see this chart, i was so proud of it, and by the time i got to their, i never got to see it that day. but i am seeing it now, and i was very proud. if you look at the arrow on the bottom, that is the lowest level. the one on the bottom, heavy red arrow, that is the lowest level of illegal immigrants ever to come into our country recorded history. right there. and that was my last week in office. and then you see what happened after i left. look at the rest. and if you go out a little bit further, it's getting to be a little bit old, but i love it anyway, right? but you can go much higher with those numbers. look what happened right after that, the invasion began. we had the opposite, we stop the invasion. the invasion that we stopped was peanuts by comparison to what happened after i left.

look at what happened after i left. they took over our country. we ended all catch and release. we shut down asylum fraud. we stop human trafficking and forged historic agreements to keep illegal aliens on foreign soil. we want them to stay on their soil. under the trump administration, if you came in illegally, you were apprehended immediately and you were deported. you went right back. the current administration terminated every single one of those great trumpet policies that i put in place to seal the border. i wanted a sealed border. again, come in, but come in legally. you know how unfair it is? 70 people, hundreds and thousands of people have been working for years to come into our country. and now they see these people pour into our country at levels that are unprecedented, so unfair, and we are not going to do it. we are not going to stand for it. they suspended wall

construction, ended remain in mexico. the policy, remain in mexico. you think that was easy to get from the mexican government? i said you must give it to us. if you don't give it to us, there will be repercussions. and they gave it to us. not easy. canceled our safe third agreements. demolished title 42. implemented nationwide catch and release. that is catch and release, where we catch them and release them into our country. i had we catch them and release them into mexico. there is a slight difference. and it took 93, this is the previous administration, 93 executive actions to throw open our border to the world, the entire world is pouring into our country because of this very foolish administration. the greatest invasion in history is taking place right here in our country. they are coming in from every corner of the earth, not just from south america, but from africa, asia, the middle east. they're coming from everywhere. they are coming at levels that we have never seen before. it is an invasion, indeed.

and this administration does absolutely nothing to stop them. they are coming from prisons. they're coming from jails. they are coming from mental institutions and insane asylums. you know, the press is always on me because i say this. has anyone seen silence of the lambs? the late, great hannibal lector . he'd love to have you for dinner. that is insane asylums. they are emptying out their insane asylums. and terrorists are coming in at numbers that we have never seen before. bad things are going to happen. meanwhile, our crime rate is going up, while crime statistics all over the world are going down, because they are taking the criminals and they are putting them into our country. a certain country, that i happen to like. the president of that country, he is cutting great publicity because he is a

wonderful shepherd of the country. he says how well the country is doing, because there crime rate is down. and he said he is training all of these rough people, they are rough, rough, rough. he is training them. and i've been reading about this for two years, i think that's wonderful, let's take a look at it. but then i realize he's not training them, he is sending all of his criminals, his drug dealers, his people that are in jails, he is sending them all to the united states. and he is different, in that he doesn't say that. he is trying to convince everybody what a wonderful job he does in running the country. he doesn't do a wonderful job. and, by the way, if iran one of the countries, many, many countries from all over, i would be worse than any of them. i would've had to place totally emptied out already. but we become a dumping ground for the rest of the world, which is laughing at us. they think we're stupid. and we can't believe they're

getting away with what they are getting away with. but they are not going to be getting away with it for long, that's what i can tell you. in venezuela, caracas, high crime. caracas, venezuela. really dangerous place. but not anymore. because in venezuela, crime is down to 72%, in fact, if they would ever win this election, i hate even say that, we will have our next republican convention in venezuela, because it will be safe. our cities, our cities will be so unsafe, we will not be able to have it there. in el salvador, murders are down by 70%. why are they down? he would have you convinced that because he has trained murderers to be wonderful people. no. they are down because they are

sending their murderers to the united states of america. this is going to be very bad. and bad things are going to happen, and you are seeing it happen all the time. that is why to keep our family safe, the republican platform promises to launch the largest deportation operation in the history of our country. even larger than than that of president dwight d eisenhower from many years ago. you know, he was a moderate, but he believe very strongly in borders. he had the largest deportation operation we've ever had. just recently i spoke to the grieving mother of a wonderful woman. a precious 12-year-old girl from houston who, last month, was tied up, assaulted, and strangled to death after walking to the convenience store just a block away from her house. her body was dumped near the

side of the road in a shallow creek, found by some onlookers who could not believe what they had witnessed. charged with joslin's heinous murderer, two illegal aliens from venezuela who came across our border, were in custody, and were then released into the country by this horrible, horrible administration that we have right now. i also met recently with the heartbroken mother and sister of rachel morin. rachel was a mom of five, beautiful children, who was rape and murdered while out on a run. she wanted to keep in good shape, she was murdered. the monster who is responsible, another from el salvador. before he was let into america but by the white house. the white house let them in. he then attacked a nine-year- old girl and her mother in a home invasion in los angeles before murdering rachel in

maryland. traveled all throughout the country doing tremendous damage. rachel's mother will never be the same. i spent time with her, she will never be the same. i also met with the wonderful family of lakin riley, the beautiful 22-year-old nursing student. she was so proud of being first in her class. who was out for a jog on the campus of the university of georgia when she was assaulted, beaten, and horrifically killed. yet another american life was stolen by a criminal alien set free by this administration. and these were incredible people we are talking about. these were incredible people who died. tonight america, this is my vow. i will not let these killers and criminals into our country. i will keep our sons and daughters safe as we bring

security to our streets. we will help bring stability to the world. i was the first president in modern times to start no new wars. we were the toughest, we were the most respected. and you saw this. hungry, strong country run by very powerful, tough leaders. tough guy. the press doesn't like him because he's tough. and he came out recently, they were asking him at an interview , the whole world is exploding. what's happening, what's going on? viktor orban, prime minister of hungary, a very tough man. he said i don't want people coming into my country and blowing up our shopping centers and killing people. but i said to him, tell us what's going on, what's happening, what is it? he said there's only one way you are going to solve it. you've got to bring president trump back to the united

states. it because he kept everybody at bay. he used the word i wouldn't use, because i can't use that word, because you'd say it was braggadocio's. the press would say he was a braggart. i'm not a braggart. but viktor orban said it. he said russia was afraid of him. china was afraid of him. everybody was afraid of him. nothing was going to happen. the whole world was at peace, and now the world is blowing up around us. all of these things that you read about were not going to happen. under president bush, russia invaded georgia. under president obama, russia took crimea. under the current administration, russia is after all of ukraine. under president trump, russia took nothing.

we defeated 100% of isis in syria and iraq. something that was said to take five years, serve. we did it in a matter of a couple of months. we have a great military. our military is not woke, it is just some of the full on top of that are woke. i got along very well in north korea, kim jongun, i got along very well with him. the press hated when i said that. how can you get along with him? well, it's nice to get along with somebody who has a lot of nuclear weapons, or otherwise. in the old days they would say that's a wonderful thing. now they say how could you possibly do that? but no, i got along with him.

and we stopped the missile launchers from north korea, now north korea is acting up again. but when we get back, i got along with him. he'd like to see me back, too. i think he misses me, if you want to know the truth. our opponents inherited a world of peace and turned it into a planet of war. we are a planet of war. look at that attack on israel. look at what's happening with ukraine. the cities are just bombed out. how can people live like that? when massive buildings are falling to the ground? it began to unravel with the disastrous withdrawal from afghanistan, the worst humiliation in the history of our country. we have never had a humiliation like that. 13 heroic u.s. service members were tragically and needlessly killed. 45 others were horrifically wounded. nobody ever talks about them. no arms, no legs. face explosions.

horrifically, horrifically wounded. and, by the way, we have a man in this room who is running for the u.s. senate from the great state, nevada, named sam brown. who paid the ultimate price. thank you, sam. thank you, sam. thank you. he paid the biggest price probably ever paid by anybody that is running for office, and i think is going to do great. he is running against a person that is not good, not respected, a total lightweight. but sam, i think, really, we were talking about it with some of the senators who are working so hard for sam. but he paid the biggest price of any senator ever to run for the senate. i don't think anyone has ever

heard what he did. he was a real hero, really great person, and he is running. and i hope that everybody gets out and votes for sam brown. we also left behind $85 billion worth of military equipment, along with many american citizens who are left behind. many, many american citizens, emboldened by the disaster. russia invaded ukraine. we saw this group of people that were incompetent. we took the folders out first, no, we are going to take the soldiers out second. if they were to follow my plan, we had a great plan. but the plan only kicked and if they did everything perfectly, and they were doing things perfectly. so we said it doesn't kick in. you know, 18 months in afghanistan, we didn't have one, they were killing them left and right, snipers, and i spoke to the head of the taliban . you've heard this story.

still there, still the head of the taliban. the prescott on me, why would you speak to him? i said because that is where the killing is. i don't have to speak to somebody who has nothing to do with it. and i told him, don't ever do that again, don't ever, ever do that again. you've got to stop, because during the obama administration many great people and soldiers, a lot of soldiers were being killed from long-distance. i said if you keep doing that you are going to be hit harder than anybody has ever been hit by country before. and he said i understand, your excellency. he called me your excellency. i wonder if he calls the other guy your excellency. i doubt it. the other guy gave him everything. i mean, what kind of a deal is that? he walked out and gave him everything. you know that right now afghanistan is one of the largest sellers of weapons in

the world? they are selling the brand-new, beautiful weapons that we gave them. but, think of it. he actually said to me but why do you show me a picture of my home? i said you will have to ask your people or one of your wives. but he could figure it out. and for 18 months we had not one attack on an american soldier by the taliban. 18 months. and then we had that horrible day where soldiers were killed. i was not there, because of the ridiculous election. but we had that horrible attack. and they also give up one of the biggest bases anywhere in the world, airbases anywhere in the world. the longest runways, most powerful, hardened, thickened runways. we give it up. and i like that,

not because of afghanistan, i liked it because of china. it is one hour away from where china makes their nuclear weapons. and you know who has it now? china has it now. we were keeping that. and now china is likewise circling taiwan and russian warships, and nuclear submarines are operating 60 miles off the coast in cuba. do you know that? the press refuses to write about it. if that were me running this country, and we had nuclear submarines in cuba, i will tell you, the headlines every day would be what is wrong with our president? you don't even hear this, you are not hearing about this. russia has nuclear submarines and warships 60 miles away, mr. congressman. from miami, by the way, happens to be here. correct

back. they better be back before i assume office, or you will be paying a very big price. with our victory in november, the years of war, weakness, and chaos will be over. i do not have wars, other than isis, which i defeated. we had no wars. i could stop wars with a telephone call. i could stop wars with just a telephone call. they would never start. we will replenish our military

and build in iron dome missile defense system to ensure that no enemy can strike our homeland. and this great iron dome will be built entirely in the usa. we will build it. also in wisconsin, just constant, just like i gave you that massive ships contract andt you are doing a very nice job, governor, right? thank you, governor. and they are doing a great job. in fact, i had a little design change. we used to call destroyers, these are now the most beautiful, we have to take the bow and we have to make it a little nicer, and more pointy instead of a flat nose, the people at the shipyards says, this guy knows what he is doing. the most beautiful ships. governor? everybody over there.

everybody wanted the contract, but i gave it to wisconsin. we will have a lot of that built right here in the state of wisconsin. israel has in iron dome, a missile defense system. 342 missiles were shot into israel and only one got there a little bit weird it was badly wounded and fell to the ground, but most -- ronald reagan one of this many years ago, but we did not have the technology many years ago. remember, they called it starship, spaceship, anything to mock him, but he was a very good president. very, very good. but now we have unbelievable tech knowledge he. and why should other countries have this and we don't? no, no. we will build an iron dome over our country and we will be sure that nothing can come and harm our people. again, from an economic development standpoint, we will make it all right here. i no more sending it out to other countries. it is america first. t

america first. we will unleash the power of american innovation. as we do, we will soon be on the verge of finding cures to cancer, alzheimer's disease, and many other diseases. we will get to the bottom of it. you bremember this gentleman that i do not want to mention other than the one time i had to, because i had to do it. i did not want anybody to be confused. but this man said, we will find the cure for cancer, nothing happened. we will get to the cure for cancer and alzheimer's, and so many other things, we are so close to doing something great. but we need a leader that will let it be done. we will not have men playing in women's sport.

and we will restore and renovate our nation's once great cities making them safe, clean, and beautiful again. and that includes our nation's capital, which is a horrible killing field. they leave from wisconsin, they go to the washington monument, they end up getting stabbed, killed, or shot. we will be very soon, very proud of our capital again, washington, d.c. america is on the cusp of a new golden age, but we will have the courage to seize it, we will make it current, we have to bring this into a golden age like never seen before. remember this, china wants to do it, japan wants to do it. all of these countries want to do it. we have to reduce massive amounts of energy if we are going to reduce -- if you look

at some of the things that have been done, and some of the things that we are going to do, but ai needs tremendous, literally, twice the electricity that is available now in our country. can you imagine? but instead, we have places where they recharge electric cars, they built eight chargers at a certain location for the midwest. eight chargers, $9 billion, think of them as a tank for filling up your gas. think of it. they spent $9 billion on eight chargers, three of which did not work. and if you were going to do this all over our country, this crazy electric mandate, by the way, i am all for elect trick, they have their application, but if somebody wants to buy a

gas powered car, gasoline powered car or a hybrid, they will be able to do it. and we will make that change on day one. so to conclude, just a few short days ago, my journey with you nearly ended. we know that. and yet here we all tonight all gathered together to talk about future problems, and a total renewal of the thing we love very much, it is called america. we live in a world of miracles, none of us knows god's plan or where life's adventure will take us. i want to thank franklin graham for being here tonight, an outstanding man. he wrote me a note recently, i have a lot of respect for him. sir, i love your storytelling, i think it is great in front of these big rallies, but sir, do

me one favor, it will not make any difference, please do not use any foul language. i was a little embarrassed. it will not make any difference, actually, it does. the story has, it would not be very good. the story is not quite as good, to be honest. i have to have a talk with franklin, but he was great, great donovan. his father was so great. billy graham. my father would take me to see billy graham at yankees stadium. he was a big rally guy too. but he would get up and he was a fantastic guy. my father loved billy graham. and i love franklin graham. i was working so hard to adhere to his note to me. i am working hard on it, franklin. but if the events of last saturday make anything clear, it is that every single moment we have on earth is a gift from

god. we have to make the most of every day for the people and for the country that we love. the attacker in pennsylvania wanted to stop our movement, but the truth is, the movement has never been about me, it has always been about you, it is t your movement, the biggest movement in our country. it cannot be stopped. it cannot be stopped. it has always been about the hard-working patriotic citizens of america. for too long, our nation has settled for 2 little. we have given everything to other nations, other people. you have been told to lower your expectations into except less from your families. i am here tonight with the opposite message. your expectations are not big enough. not big enough.

it is time to start expecting and demanding the biggest leadership in the world. leadership that is bold, dynamic, relentless, and fearless. we can do that. we are americans, ambition is our heritage, greatness is our birthright. as long as our energies are spent fighting each other, our destiny will remain out of reach . and that is not acceptable. we must instead take that energy and use it to realize our country's true potential and write our own thrilling chapter of the american story. we can do it together, we can unite. we will come together, and w success will bring us together. it is a story of love, sacrifice, and so many other things. and remember the word devotion.

it is unmatched devotion. our american ancestors crossed the delaware, survived the icy winter at valley forge and defeated a mighty empire to establish our cherished republic. they fought so hard and lost so many. they pushed thousands and thousands of miles across a dangerous frontier, taming the wilderness to build a life in a magnificent home for their family. they packed their families into covered wagons and trekked across hazardous trails, scaled towering mountains and braved rivers and rapids to stake their claim on the wide open new and very beautiful frontier. when our way of life was threatened, american patriots marched onto the battlefield, rushed into enemy strongholds and stared down death and stared down those enemies to ar keep alive the flame of a freedom. at yorktown, gettysburg, and

midway, they joined the rollcall of immortal heroes, so many heroes. so many great, great people. and we have to cherish those people. we cannot forget those people. we have to cherish those people. and building monuments to those great people is a good thing, not a bad thing. no challenge was too much, no hardship was too great. no enemy was too fierce. together these patriots soldiered on and endured. they prevailed because they had faith in each other, faith in their country. above all, they had faith in their god. just like our ancestors, we

must come together, rise past differences, any disagreement have to be put aside. go forward united as one people, one nation, pledging allegiance to one great, beautiful, i think it is so beautiful, american flag. tonight, i ask for your partnership, for your support. and i am humbly asking for your vote. i want your vote. we will make our country great again. every day i will strive to honor the trust you have placed in me and i will never, ever let you down. i promise that. i will never let you down. two all of the forgotten men and women who have been neglected, abandoned, and left behind, you will be forgotten hi no longer. we will press forward. together, we will win, win, win.

win, win, win, win, win. nothing will sway us. nothing will slow us, and no one will ever stop us. no matter what dangers come our way, no matter what obstacles y, lie in our path, we will keep striving toward our shared and glorious destiny. and we will not fail, we will not fail. together, we will save this country, we will restore the republic, and we will usher in the rich and wonderful tomorrows that our people so

truly deserve. america's future will be bigger, better, bolder,l brighter, happier, stronger, prettier, greater, and more united than ever before. and quite simply put, we will very quickly make america great again. thank you very much. thank you very much. god bless you. god bless you, wisconsin. and god bless the united states of america, our great country. thank you very much, everybody. thank you.

>> the balloon drop has commenced. donald trump giving his acceptance speech for the third time presidential nominee for the republican party. melania trump does not ever appear with him anymore this is the first time she has been seen by his side. i do not know exactly how long, but in a very long time. having sort of an awkward greeting with her on the stage. it was a little performative.

he appeared to be feigning surprise to see her. and then his running mate jd vance and his wife joining him on the stage. this is not just the longest convention speech in the modern era, it is the longest convention speech in the modern era by a very long way. the previous record holder was donald trump in 2016 when he gave the longest convention speech that there had ever been given in the modern era. i think this surpassed by about 20 minutes. we knew this would be a long speech. we got first the excerpts and the full brunt of it scripted at probably about an hour. but this came in over an hour and a half long. this was a fidel castro kind of

experience. the former president did get to most of the words on the teleprompter, but added a whole lot more. >> yeah. there was a lot of extra cereal in the box, if you will. interestingly, it was pointed out to me that fox news had stopped carrying his speeches some months ago. and i thought that was curious. it was when there was a lot on them about electrocution and shock. i think when you watch what is arguably his biggest opportunity to speak to the most americans, you see a little bit of wear some of that thinking might be. this was very extemporaneous. i think about half and half. about half of it was the scripted speech, and there was about 50% extra added. in the room, it was messianic. people were crying, they definitely loved it. >> the new york times, by the

end -- by the end of the speech, people were emptying. >> the great bottom line on this in the beginning, things are changed, in the end, it was clear he had not very much. if you are wondering what impact this has on a viewing audience, you have to wonder how much of the viewing audience stayed through. it was longer than a current modern baseball game. it was very lengthy and me and rick. i hope that the bigger message, anyone on the pro-democracy side got it tonight, the pro- democracy candidate can beat him and by a lot, rendering the story that you have meaningless if that should happen. if you are looking in here for kernels of substance describing what happened to them on saturday night, this is the one and only time he will do that, we will see.

it seemed like a story that once he got into it, he was very connecting over it and sharing. >> i want to make sure that people understand, in case you did not watch the whole speech, at the beginning of his speech, trump came out and he was very soft-spoken reticent, soft- spoken, singsong, but very tightly scripted, reading the teleprompter, the re-creation, the deception moment by moment of the shooting at his rally last saturday. people in the crowd were weeping and he did dramatically say that you will hear this from me once and never again. it was very strange in the opening, very moving for the people in the room. >> we will see if that is the only time he ever tells the story. it is a bit of a political history we all witnessed together. there is a lot of audacity, there are also a few towels. i think he saw the impact of the immunity decision in some of his speech, bragging about

calling people who had come to the country illegally and invasion so he could use the military. that was a line in the speech. he also showed his hand a little bit on how he would pursue and identify enemies, saying they are a threat to democracy, i am protecting democracy. so i saw a few flashing yellow lights in this. i think the larger political thing for everyone to understand is that this is not a focused candidate, not a disciplined candidate, this is not a candidate with a simple message of what he wants to do. when he stands alone, he certainly appears to be someone who should easily be contracted to -- >> this was a 78-year-old man who had gone through a profoundly traumatic experience, forced to reckon with his own utility and how scary that was for him.

and that he is an old man in the latter stages of his life, most likely. 78 years old, but time comes for all of us. and that part of it was a part of trump that you do not see because i do not think he enjoys thinking about that at all. i also felt like the biggest take away after what has been three of the most painful weeks i have ever seen in democratic politics, this is not a colossus. this is not the big bad wolf, this is not a vigorous and incredibly adept political communicator. this is an old man in decline who has been doing the should same shtick for a very long time and is really wearing pretty thin. and he is a beatable candidate. this was not, and democrats

have been doing a lot of panic, fear, anxiety, and understandably so. but i do not think anybody watched that speech and thought, wow, that is incredible, that is going to be hard to top, that will be hard to beat, how will we message against the sky? and that is what he does it every rally. that was just a trump rally but with some speech woven through. i just think, you've got to look at that and think, like, it is really important if you are on the pro-democracy part of the country to stop him from getting back into office. but that should be a doable thing. >> so the concept of conventions in the television age has been prime time. there are three towers of prime time in television. 8, 9, 1050 final job of the men at the convention was to make sure that the presidential

nominee was on between 10:00 and 11:00 here the final hour of time time. because that actually reaches across the country more strongly than any of the other prime times. he went on it 10:30. which means 30 minutes of his speech was in prime time, and then he went on for another hour after that. and so that is a complete failure of convention scheduling that people have been working with since the 1960s, that you are supposed to try to, you must observe. and donald trump watching that guy over the edge that donald trump has for guys like that is low energy. he is the one that invented that to describe job bush. that was a very low energy donald trump. you had to be a donald trump worshiper to hang in for the whole 90 minutes and listen to all of it. this was a speech where you are trying to get people who you do not already have. i do not see how this speech

could have done that. >> to paraphrase eric kill monger, magda, is this your king? if joe biden had given a rambling, shambling, all over the place speech like that, elected democrats would be demanding that the 25th amendment be invoked immediately. they would scramble even worse than they are now to jettison him as the candidate for president and we would be questioning his mental acuity. donald trump went off that script for more than half of it. we had the text in front of us. he clearly was bored by the text. and then became an old vaudevillian who would much prefer his own shtick and

therefore fighting sticks to the --. that is proof that there is not just one old man in the race. donald trump is an old man clearly in decline. and we must start talking about him the same way that we are questioning joe biden. because donald trump cannot stay on message for even 5 to 2 minutes, even telling a story about the most dramatic moment of his life. he still eventually got to sharks and hannibal lector. he cannot stop doing it. you know, i see this as someone who absolutely adores senior citizens, they are my favorite of all. but one thing that happens when they begin to decline is that they go to safe places in their mind, stories they are comforted by, can remember, and recite, and they do it over and over again.

donald trump is not a candidate that democrats should be terrified of. their terror is embarrassing tonight. magda, is this your king wax that is what i've got. >> i want to go over to joseph. we saw him being assaulted by gold balloons. i am glad to see you win that fight. >> not quite, rachel. you can see former president trump and jd vance right here. i have to tell you, rachel, it is an almost unspeakable feeling to be in a room that is such a celebratory nature and hear the man behind me talk about deporting more people than president dwight eisenhower in 1954, and operation with a name so racist that it is not appropriate to say on television. he is talk about removing more than 10 million people from this country who have been here, many of them since they were little children, they have

contributed to the society and economy, they live in all of our neighborhoods and communities, and now we are throwing balloons around as if this is a party. he talked about the democrats, again, cheating. sheet was a word that he used, in the last election. after saying he was here to unify the nation. it is a bizarre feeling. and i'm not sure i am able to fully articulate it right now. they are painting it as a party, but it is a deeply divisive message anyway you want to look at it. you can put the unity bumper sticker all over it. but what we heard tonight was not a message of ringing people together, it literally was a message of kicking millions of people out of the country. >> he literally talked about how he would empty out the whole country. he fantasized about being the head of other countries as well and how he would empty them out. thank you.

i will not make you, i will not make you back and forth with me too much, because i know you are in a loud spot. but think you for that. alex, i want to get your reaction to what you heard in the speech. are you okay? you just gave me a look. >> we are here. we are all still here. political strategist twitter had some choice phrases, including crushingly stupid and incoherent lunacy. but i can for aging autocrat. you pointed out that this was like fidel castro in length. castro tended to give longside winders, incoherent ones as they were aging. it is symptomatically party that indulges in a cult of personality. it puts all its chips on the persona of one individual and their frailties and strengths. in this case, i think there were a lot more frailties than there were strengths. i do not think it was

coincidence that in addition to ad-libbing -- crazy nancy pelosi, quote / unquote, he also brought kim jong-un into the speech. it is like what you said, he is retreating to parts of his mind that give him comfort. the people that hold a special place in his mental tunnel. and it is very revealing. the fact that he has been allowed to indulge himself like this is a damning indictment of the republican party. and i agree with, you know, everything you guys have said. he is actually an incredibly weak candidate. you know, we should redirect our focus to his weaknesses, his indulgences, the cult that surrounds him, the autocratic tendencies. this is a republican party, this is their celebration. those balloons are for donald

trump. >> it is a good point to talk about how a speech like it is about indulging the man giving it. when you have been told that everywhere that pops into your head is worth saying and everybody wants to hear it, you put that many words out. what did you think? >> undoubtedly. i will say this to echo what lauren said earlier, being a part of many convention speeches past, this is not a traditional one. we can all agree, the first 35 to 40 minutes were about himself. they were about donald trump. as you said earlier, rachel, he did stick to the teleprompter for a page and a half or so there, he also, for a man who is not a person of faith, but hasn't struck a chord with the faith community in our country, refer to himself, this is a line that stuck out to me, i stand before you only by the grace of almighty god, it made many say it was a presidential moment. we do not know, he said he would not talk about this again, he was surrounded by

photos of his own ludy face. that was projected in the arena. obviously that was a very traumatic moment for him, for the country. but he also spoke about this as if it was a calling from god, in a moment where he was positioning himself in that way. which struck me for obvious reasons. but we will also see if he speaks about this moving forward. >> i was also thinking to your point, the weakness of him, if you are tuning in and not really paying attention, you are undecided, i do not know who these people are, you may tune in and think, maybe the other guy. >> yeah, that was one thing. because he was meandering, it was strange and hard to follow. hannibal was included. >> you can see why fox does not show his rallies anymore. i think for most americans,

they do not experience the rallies. tim alberta tweeted, the reporter tim alberta tweeted, i'm standing 10 feet from the stage in a sea of diehards, some are getting restless. checking phones, stealing glances at the tele-printer, whispering about when it will be over. and i googled, because we had plenty time to google the longest fidel castro speeches. he did not quite get there. >> seven hours and 10 minutes at the communist party conference in havana in 1986. >> the asides used to be the best part of the trump speeches . >> stephanie ruhle is in milwaukee, she was able to see it at the arena. stephanie, what do you have? what did you think? >> i mean, this was short of extraordinary. we could go line by line fact

checking donald trump and all he said about the economy. i would just say that there are all sorts of gross exaggerations with regards to immigrants are stealing our jobs, he had the greatest economy ever, none of those things are true. what is interesting is that it was a long, long rambling speech. much to criticize. i just heard joyce talk about tim alberta thing people were checking in their phones and seeing what was on the teleprompter, people in the room again to get bored. i would be curious to see when and if we hear any republicans be critical of the speech in the way that democrats obviously will be after the debate. something that really had me scratching my head about an hour and a half ago was the dana white and hulk hogan effect. we are talking about the republican national convention. normally on this stage is when you see the gop all-stars on stage. numbers of past administrations they are. and here we have only the trump family. katie vance and his wife. for the most part, members of trumps original cabinet are not even supporting him.

his former vice president is not here because he is not endorsing donald trump. but the dana white and hulk hogan thing is really about donald trump rejecting this macho man. in the average person who does not follow politics will not see this hour plus rambling speech. but what they are going to get tomorrow on the wwe youtube channel, one of the most popular with 103 million subscribers, you will have the huckster out there talk about his licensing for donald trump, he is the toughest guy ever, and in a way saying the same thing. i will be curious to see if i will have any impact. anyone who saw this entire speech was thinking, while, that made no sense, he went on and on, it was low-energy, it was rambling. he said nothing new or insightful. but let's see tomorrow with a sound bite machine how things get flipped and pumped out. some of those voters who do not pay attention every day, what they actually think. >> it will be interesting.

this is a good point about how much of this unfiltered will have been watched again. it is not a particularly high rated and well watched convention, but when you go on for more than an hour and a half this time of night, how many people are watching? i think the fewer people watching, the better for this trump campaign. i want to bring in our friend michael / peer by the rules of this broadcast, we have to find you. michael, we have invoked your name. talking about one very simple metric of this speech, which is that it is by far, by a mile, the longest convention speech ever given in the modern era. you suggested that might itself tell us a little bit of something about the function of donald trump's candidacy right now. >> it sure does. the records for second-longest and third longest were donald trump in 2016 and 2020.

but this one really eat all. you know, to get away from the jokes, which obviously with a speech like that, everything going on much too long, the reason why castro spoke for 4 hours or five hours at a time, and they really did come in they mentioned everything that came into his brain, that is what it sounded like tonight, was because they were dictators and the people who worked with them were terrified to tell them they should make a shorter speech. and that is what happens when you have a colt. may i suggest with the most important thing about tonight is, rachel? >> please. >> this historical moment is the one thing he did not mention. you know, he said on day one, he is going to start drilling for oil, and he will close the borders. that is not what he has been promising for the last number of months. he has been promising on day one to be dictator for a day.

and all i am saying is that historically, the most important thing about tonight, he either intentionally or otherwise avoided the subject is how he would change the country. will he use a supreme court with this new immunity ruling to become the most powerful president we have ever had? making arbitrary decisions, some of them are unlawful, but as long as they are called official acts, and make changes, such as pulling america out of nato until russia, in his own words, under certain circumstances, do whatever the -- you want. this is the most decisive moment in american history i have ever seen in a presidential election. and i think we cannot be dissuaded. 15 weeks from now, we will know if this night led to renewed democracy, rebirth of freedom, as lincoln wanted us to have, or whether it led to

dictatorship and the strongest president in history doing all sorts of things we cannot imagine. >> nbc news presidential historian michael best loft putting a cap on it for us tonight. michael, thank you. in a rambling, meandering, sweating, obviously, like, easily distract did, singsong, soft-spoken, awkward speech, donald trump became the new world record holder for longest convention speech in american politics in modern history. and also the three time nominee of the republican party for resident. thank you for being with us. the site and every night during the republican national convention. our coverage continues now with the host of the weekend on msnbc. stay with us.