Trump tells RNC ‘God’ was on his side in Pennsylvania, says nation must ‘heal’ political divide
Former President Donald Trump said, “God was on his side” as bullets zipped past his head and brave Secret Service agents pounced on him to protect him from a sniper this past weekend.
Trump said the “love was written all over their faces” of people in the crowd Saturday who didn’t leave, yet “thought it was over” and he was hit in the head. That’s what Trump said compelled him to “raise his right arm and start shouting fight, fight, fight!”
It was all part of his Republican National Convention acceptance speech Thursday night, which started with an appeal to “stop the division of our society” and “heal” that divide and go forward “more united than ever before.”
“I’m not supposed to be here tonight,” Trump told the RNC crowd. “I stand before you in this area only by the grace of the almighty God.”
He then asked the RNC delegates to observe a moment of silence for firefighter Corey Comperatore, 50, killed at the Butler, Pa., shooting. Trump also paused as the firefighter’s helmet and jacket were brought out to the stage.
Trump also announced that $6.3 million has been raised for Comperatore’s family and the other two injured in the shooting, David Dutch, 57, of New Kensington, and James Copenhaver, 74, of Moon Township, Pa. Both have been upgraded to serious but stable condition, according to a spokesperson with Allegheny Health Network.
Trump, in an often somber tone, said he “pledged” to “turn our nation around.” He added, “We are all fellow citizens” and called for the “demonization” of political disagreement to stop.
He also sent a warning to Democrats to stop “weaponizing” the courts, alluding to his court cases.
Melania Trump and VP nominee JD Vance, both in attendance, were given a round of applause.
Trump said he has a “vision for all of America” and asked for a chance to prove it to young and old. He said the pandemic hit his first administration hard, but he’s up for another four years.
He called out “totally incompetent” Democratic leadership, inflation, porous border and vowed to “drill baby drill” to help reduce energy costs. He warned China and Iran remain threats to the U.S. He also said Hispanics and the “Black population” and unions are “suffering” from out-of-control illegal immigration.
“We will soon be a great nation again,” he added.
“Two things on day one: Drill baby drill and close our borders,” he said, adding he wants “people to come into this country, but legally.”
In a PowerPoint tour de force, Trump mentioned the chart he put up on the screen that “saved his life” as he turned his head Saturday in Pennsylvania, that same border fever chart was shown to the RNC crowd on every screen to give him an opportunity to turn to it again — this time in the safety of the convention.
“It is an invasion indeed,” Trump said, adding that criminals “are being put in our country … we’ve become a dumping ground for the rest of the world.”
He said if elected, he would launch the “largest deportation” program in the history of the nation.
“I could stop wars with just a telephone call,” Trump said when talking about a world on fire in Ukraine and Gaza after the Hamas terror attack. He also vowed to build “an Iron Dome over the country” — in an “America first” theme.
Eric Trump, in the run-up to his father’s address, rattled off the platform of the next Trump administration, if he wins Nov. 5, that included helping veterans “sleeping in the streets,” mothers working “three jobs” to afford groceries, underappreciated law enforcement officers, young women forced to play sports with “6-foot, 5-inch men,” and parents who lost children to fentanyl.
“I’m sorry,” Eric Trump said in a refrain. “We will stand behind you.”
While Trump was still speaking — concluding a few minutes past midnight — the Democrats were sending out emails saying they were raising donations off the speech.
“Since Donald Trump started his Republican convention speech, people from all across the country have been making a huge number of donations to the Democratic National Committee,” the Democratic Party stated in an email blast.