One word diehard supporters always say about Donald Trump
Donald Trump has spent a week in Milwaukee basking in glory. But even diehard supporters are sceptical and there is one word that always crops up.
The Republican delegate from Texas was blunt.
“He’s a jerk,” she told news.com.au in Milwaukee.
“Donald Trump’s a jerk.
“But he loves his family and he loves his country.”
In discussions with Republicans at the party’s National Convention (RNC) last week there were quite a few “buts” when it came to Donald Trump.
“Sometimes he says things the way I would not say it,” Mitzi from Texas, wearing a cowboy hat, Stars and Stripes sunglasses and matching scarf, confided to news.com.au.
“But he has moved the country in the right direction and I pray he does the same thing again.”
“I’m not in some Trump admiration cult or anything,” Lawrence Hudson of Illinois said. “But he’s a good guy.”
But the “buts” are in hushed tones.
In Milwaukee it was easy to ignore the buts and get swept up in the surface intoxicating adulation of Trump.
There was a huge sense of relief – that Trump has survived the attempt on his life, right before last week’s convention began. But that had given way to almost pure joy. Delegates felt momentum was on their side, that arguments that there was a crisis at the border with Mexico were resonating, and Joe Biden’s shambolic performance at the presidential debate had bolstered Trump.
Although now, those feelings of joy might be tempered with Mr Biden pulling out of the race.
Last week, as you walked around the streets of the Milwaukee, people wore T-shirts bearing Trump’s mug shot, bandages were attached to ears in homage to his injury, even tattoos bearing his name and face were spotted.
Many Republicans appeared to have either rationalised their doubt about the party’s presidential candidate or buried them deep down.
Of course, there are no perfect politicians. It’s unrealistic to expect your views will always chime with someone you might vote for. It’s all a compromise.
Nonetheless, it remains surprising that the MAGA base – made up of a lot of deeply religious, conservative Americans who are big on morality – should be so enamoured by a man who has had his fair share of scandals and is now a criminal.
Even on the policy front, Trump failed in his key note speech to mention one of the right’s most important issues: abortion.
There was barely a squeak of protest.
The overarching theme at the Republican National Convention was unity, and unity was what the party got.
Nothing got in the way of the one true goal: get the Democrats out of the White House, get Trump in and “Make American Great Once Again”.
Any grumbles about Trump or his policies have been filed away and kicked into the long grass.
Trump is an unlikely torch bearer for the Christian right. However, for all his complications, they believe he’s the man who will – eventually – shape their beliefs into laws. One delegate told news.com.au it could take 12 years to fully realise a reshaping of the US, longer then Trump will be in office.
At times the RNC seemed surreal.
On Wednesday, a criminal just released from prison took to the convention stage and was giving a hero’s welcome by an adoring crowd – the same crowd which had spent days loudly fretting about crime.
Former Trump official Peter Navarro was convicted of contempt of Congress for refusing to front up to the January 6 Capitol uprising inquiry. He served four months in prison.
But — and there’s that word again — the delegates believe this, and Trump’s conviction, to be “weaponised justice” by the Democratic Party and so shrug it off.
That day Navarro had left a jail in Miami. But by the evening he was effectively back in one in Milwaukee. The city’s usually bustling CBD was sealed off behind huge black metal fences and concrete blocks.
Milwaukee had become a prison that 50,000 people were desperate to gain access to.
What was sealed off from the outside world was a Trump jamboree.
What American Women Want
There were so many costumes, it was like a Pride celebration where the only colours allowed were red, white and blue.
At a street fair, you could buy Wisconsin fried cheese curds and Miller beer memorabilia while perusing phone plans from Patriot Mobile – tagline: “Mobilising freedom”.
A bus from Christian organisation Concerned Women of America had a giant banner that stated “What American Women Want … is ‘strong leadership’, ‘girls sports for girls only’, and no abortion (‘Choose life, your mom did’)”.
Across the road a souvenir stall sold stickers that proclaimed “Women for Trump”. Seemingly What American Women Want is to only be able to buy these stickers in hot pink.
Inside the sports arena, where the speeches took place, it was a political rally, for sure, but mixed with a church service and rock concert focused on one man. It was evangelical. The crowd was enraptured.
Every few minutes, they burst into a Trump catchphrase: “drill, baby drill”, “Joe must go”, or simply, “fight, fight, fight”.
The speeches were rousing but soon began to blur into one another: “The country is a mess, Trump will save it, close the border, God Bless the United States of America”.
Abortion was policy non grata. All that energy instead was poured into the hot button issue of immigration and promised mass deportations. But some of the biggest boos come when so-called “gender ideology” was mentioned and the supposed “indoctrination” of children.
It’s a worrying time to be a transgender American.
Iron Throne
Around half way through each evening Trump would enter in dramatic fashion. Sporting his now famous bandage on his ear, he would take his place on a cream padded armchair opposite the stage.
But it felt more like an Iron Throne.
In 2022, Trump being the presidential candidate seemed absurd.
Now politicians, celebrities and “everyday Americans” took to the stage in quick succession to pledge their allegiance and laud Trump as the “bravest”, “greatest”, or even “funniest” man they had ever been in the presence of. The man himself smiled benignly.
Vanquished foes — such as two of Trump’s rivals for the presidential nomination, Ron De Santis and Nikki Haley — pledged allegiance.
In her speech, Ms Haley at least acknowledged she and Trump weren’t “100 per cent” on the same page.
“Take it from me, I haven’t always agreed with President Trump but we agree more often than we disagree,” Ms Haley said.
Mr DeSantis regaled the audience with some of America’s greatest moments, such as the end of communism in Eastern Europe when Moscow’s grip fell.
And yet, many in the MAGA party seem content to pull back aid to Ukraine and NATO, which could well see Moscow try and grip Eastern Europe once more.
The past was perfect, the present a mess, was the message.
In his nomination acceptance speech, Trump said he wanted to be a president for “all America, not half of America”.
But at times it didn’t seem like the convention was aiming to win over all Americans.
It sometimes felt like two conventions. Earlier in the day, there was the one that appealed to the MAGA base.
This saw personalities grace the Milwaukee stage that wouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near a Republican Convention of the past.
Deeply divisive firebrands like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Vivek Ramaswamy and Tucker Carlson. They’re not people that appeal to the centre.
Trump family members aplenty had time at the podium.
Yet some long-time Republican figures like former speaker Kevin McCarthy were present but didn’t get a slot. And perhaps didn’t want one if it meant pledging fealty to Trump. Mike Pence, who is now a critic of the man he served as vice president under, went on holiday instead of attending.
And then, in prime time, it all changed. When millions of Americans were tuning in to watch Trump or running mate JD Vance speak, there was a more unifying, toned-down tone. No talk of elections being stolen.
‘Throw their vote away’
Lisa Borchers from Missouri told news.com.au that she didn’t like a Trump policy that would see hospitality staff not have to pay taxes on tips.
“If I have to pay taxes on all my earned income, so does everybody else,” Ms Borchers said.
“But you know what, I’m not going throw my vote over one issue. And that’s the problem: people don’t like Trump over one issue and then people throw their vote away.”
Tax on tips may not be the biggest disagreement with Trump. It’s not a “jerk”-level issue.
But quite a few Republicans seemed prepared to bite their lips and put their reservations of the man who has engulfed their party to one side come Election Day in November.
Chilling Biden warning if Trump loses
Joe Biden says he is not confident the US election in November would be peaceful, citing comments by Donald Trump, who still rejects his 2020 defeat.
‘Bald-faced lies’: Massive row erupts
Already reeling from a huge natural disaster, America has now also been plunged into a fresh political furore.
Warning on ‘unacceptable’ China risk to Aus
The US President has been warned there is “no time to wait” on a security deal involving Australia given the “grave and imminent threat” of China in the Indo-Pacific.