Trump’s triumph, a unified GOP, Biden questions: Where does the race go from here? | Opinion
They said it would be a different Donald Trump, and it was.
On Thursday night, accepting the nomination of his party and awash in the cheers of a convention crowd, the 45th president made his case to America in a bid to become the 47th.
The week of joy, unity and energy at the Republican convention in Milwaukee was very nearly a week of stunning tragedy. Instead of lifting Trump toward November victory, the party would have had to scramble to replace him amid dark days of funeral plans.
But there was an inch of difference between Trump’s death and his triumphant acceptance speech, which featured a tone that seemed wrapped in the galvanizing effect of life-changing good fortune.
Trump asserts that God protected him, and he has a lot of company in that belief. But whatever the convictions of Americans who have witnessed this miraculous week, the convention and its nominee seemed changed by its impact.
Delegates said their usual energy, based on issues and political aspirations, was joined with an abiding sense that something far larger was at hand. The convention featured speakers of various races, prayers of various faiths, and cultural moments that transcended the usual GOP flavor.
On a night featuring the exhortations of Hulk Hogan and the raucous rapping of Kid Rock, Trump was only perhaps the third loudest presence onstage. His usual boisterous tone was tempered by his brush with death, evidenced by the long minutes he spent at the beginning of his speech recounting moment by moment the experience of taking a bullet.
He then paid tribute to the hero who did not survive the day. Before the speech, the firefighter’s jacket and helmet of Corey Comperatore was rolled out on a stand at the side of the stage. Trump described how this husband and father died shielding his family as the bullets flew. He then walked to the display, placed his hands on the shoulders of the jacket and kissed the helmet. There is no comparable moment in the history of America’s political conventions.
But there is no moment to compare with the overall drama we now face. Our last president seeks to become our next president. Our current president is being hounded from office by power brokers in his own party, accompanied by the laments of many of his own voters.
The success of the Republican convention, coupled with Democratic disarray, paints a picture of Trump’s likely return to the White House, perhaps in a landslide. But if the GOP is smart, it will realize that months of news cycles lie ahead, any one of which could change the landscape.
If Vice President Kamala Harris replaces Joe Biden as their party’s nominee, with a chance of becoming the first female president, she will be harder to beat than today’s confident Republicans might think. Her ponderous word salads and spotty achievements are touted only by people who don’t plan to vote for her anyway. If she is on the ballot against Trump, the media culture that has turned on Biden will offer her up as Joan of Arc. Daily invocations of the history within our grasp will cloud much of the focus on the comparative records of the Biden/Harris and Trump years.
In his acceptance speech, Trump took broad aim at the record of his opponents, stoking nostalgia for his term, with its lower prices and stabler world. He has said he will make that case no matter who the Democratic nominee may be.
The coming days will reveal who Trump will run against. His familiar brashness will probably soon return, as will the familiar smears from desperate opponents who will dust off their Hitler smears after a few days of pretending to “lower the temperature.”
The national shock of the assassination attempt will soon blend into the shifting narratives of events that will unfold in August, September and October. Ultimately we will return to the rhythms of back-and-forth on topics like world trouble spots, the economy and borders.
On Thursday night, Trump displayed the chart comparing border incursions that had been on the big screen at the Pennsylvania rally. Turning his head to refer to it at the fateful moment on Saturday, the bullet whizzed against his ear instead of into his brain. “Last time I put up that chart, I didn’t really get to look at it,” he quipped. “Without that chart, I wouldn’t be here today.”
Trump is unmistakably here today, planning a 15-week climb to return to the White House. Joe Biden is here, in the race for another day, but for how many more? A Republican convention of uncommon harmony will now be followed by a Democrat gathering in Chicago next month sure to feature discord, uncertainty, maybe even chaos — inside and outside the arena. But that doesn’t mean the election is won or lost in the summer.
If there is any lesson of this year, perhaps this era, it is that things can change, and fast.
This story was originally published July 19, 2024 at 7:50 AM with the headline "Trump’s triumph, a unified GOP, Biden questions: Where does the race go from here? | Opinion."