Trump, fellow Republicans paint dire portrait of a U.S. under Biden
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[August 25, 2020]
By Joseph Ax and Jeff Mason
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Reuters) - President
Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans opened their national convention
on Monday by painting a dire portrait of America if Democrat Joe Biden
wins the White House in November, arguing he will usher in an era of
radical socialism and chaos.
Trump set the tone early in the day when he addressed delegates in
Charlotte, North Carolina, after formally securing their nomination for
another term, and claimed without evidence that Democrats were trying to
steal the election.
Republicans had vowed to offer an inspiring, positive message in
contrast to what they characterized as a dark and gloomy Democratic
convention last week. But the first night's prime-time program featured
speakers who peppered their remarks with ominous predictions if
Democrats win power.
"They want to destroy this country and everything that we have fought
for and hold dear," Trump campaign adviser Kimberly Guilfoyle said.
"They want to steal your liberty, your freedom. They want to control
what you see, and think, and believe, so they can control how you live."
The four-day convention opened at a critical juncture for Trump, 74, who
trails Biden, 77 in national opinion polls during a pandemic that has
killed https://graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS-USA/0100B5K8423/index.html
more than 176,000 Americans and erased millions of jobs.
Democrats drew their own dismal picture of what four more years under
Trump would look like at their convention last week.
Like its Democratic counterpart, the Republican convention was largely
virtual. Most speakers addressed a quiet auditorium in Washington, D.C.,
bowing to the reality of the pandemic despite Trump's having pushed for
a big event in front of thousands of raucous admirers.
Trump has focused on a "law and order" response to widespread protests
following the police killing of George Floyd, a Black man in
Minneapolis, and he has pushed schools and businesses to reopen despite
the pandemic. Both messages represent the campaign's effort to win back
suburban voters, especially women, who have abandoned the Republican
Party in droves during the Trump era.
Donald Trump Jr., the president's oldest son and Guilfoyle's boyfriend,
portrayed the ongoing civil unrest as violent assaults on small
businesses by anarchists and said Democrats would fail to keep
neighborhoods safe.
The dystopian language echoed that of Trump's 2017 inaugural speech,
when he vowed to end the "American carnage" of crime, poverty and
manufacturing decline. It remains to be seen whether voters find the
same argument as compelling after Trump has held power for more than
three years.
"What you heard tonight was a parade of dark and divisive fear-mongering
designed to distract from the fact that Donald Trump does not have an
affirmative case to make to the American people about why he should be
re-elected," Biden deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield said.
The convention's opening night also laid out what promises to be a
central theme of the week: that Biden, a former vice president, and his
running mate, U.S. Senator Kamala Harris, will merely be puppets of
radical left-wing activists.
Multiple speakers accused the moderate Biden of wanting to defund the
police and ban fracking, though he has rejected both positions.
Two Republican rising stars - Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the
lone Black Republican in the U.S. Senate, and Nikki Haley, Trump's
former ambassador to the United Nations, who is Indian American -
dismissed the idea that Biden and his party would be better stewards of
minority voter interests.
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President Donald Trump gives a thumbs up as Vice President Mike
Pence waves, following the President's address on the first day of
the Republican National Convention after delegates voted to confirm
him as the Republican 2020 presidential nominee for reelection, in
Charlotte, North Carolina, U.S., August 24, 2020. REUTERS/Leah
Millis
"In much of the Democratic Party, it's now fashionable to say that
America is racist," said Haley, widely seen as a possible future
presidential contender. "That is a lie. America is not a racist
country."
Another frenetic day for Trump threatened to overshadow his attempt
to recalibrate the campaign. Democrats in Congress examined U.S.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump donor, over whether he was
deliberately sabotaging mail service to harm voting by mail, while
one of Trump's closest advisers, Kellyanne Conway, prepared to
depart the White House.
The New York attorney general's investigation into Trump's family
business deepened on Monday, while the National Guard was deployed
in Wisconsin following unrest after a Black man was shot in the back
by police.
A Reuters investigation revealed a sex scandal involving evangelical
leader Jerry Falwell Jr., a high-profile Trump supporter, whose
tenure at the Christian university he runs appeared in limbo.
TRUMP ON THE ATTACK
Earlier in the day, the president repeated his assertion that voting
by mail, which is expected to be far more common during the
pandemic, will lead to widespread fraud. Independent election
security experts say voter fraud is extraordinarily rare in the
United States.
As he has done repeatedly, Trump described states' responses to
infections of COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus, in
starkly partisan terms, casting lockdowns and other steps
recommended by public health officials as attempts to influence
voting in November.
"What they're doing is using COVID to steal an election," Trump said
of Democrats. "They're using COVID to defraud the American people -
all of our people - of a fair and free election."
During the prime-time program, the party aired a video praising
Trump for his handling of the pandemic, after Democrats spent much
of their convention attacking his administration for an uneven
response.
But during two prerecorded appearances at the White House, where
Trump spoke with essential workers and rescued hostages, none of the
participants wore masks, which have become a partisan flashpoint
despite recommendations from epidemiologists that masks can slow the
disease's spread.
The night showcased some of the party's diverse members to try to
appeal beyond Trump's largely white base, including Scott, Haley,
former National Football League star Herschel Walker and Kim Klacik,
an African-American congressional candidate from Baltimore.
But the program also featured speakers seemingly aimed at firing up
Trump's base, including Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a couple from
St. Louis who drew national attention for brandishing guns at Black
Lives Matter protesters who marched past their home.
(Reporting by Joseph Ax in Princeton, New Jersey, and Jeff Mason in
Charlotte, North Carolina; Additional reporting by Jarrett Renshaw,
Leah Mills, Andrea Shalal, Heather Timmons, James Oliphant, Trevor
Hunnicutt, Michael Martina, Diane Bartz and Tim Ahmann; Editing by
Peter Cooney, Colleen Jenkins and Howard Goller)
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