Donald Trump was acclaimed as a messianic hero by tearful supporters at the Republican convention in Milwaukee last night as he staged his first public appearance since surviving an assassination attempt.
Before taking a seat next to his newly anointed running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, Mr Trump basked in the adulation of the 2,500-strong crowd who chanted “Fight! Fight! Fight!” and pumped their fists, evoking his own response after he was shot on Saturday in Pennsylvania.
His right ear bandaged from the bullet graze, the former president was accompanied by an unusually large Secret Service escort even though all the delegates will have passed through smothering security checks.
It was another reminder of how the assassination attempt has upended the 2024 race, with the beleaguered President Joe Biden thrown further onto the defensive.
The unscheduled appearance came after Mr Trump, 78, was confirmed as the Republican nominee in a celebratory roll call of state delegates at the convention. As he entered the Fiserv Forum, he was heralded by musician Lee Greenwood, who sang “God Bless the USA” before exclaiming: “Is there any doubt who’s going to be the next president of the United States? Prayer works.”
The former president himself claims that divine intervention saved him in Pennsylvania and will help save America on November 5. Hours before, a more earthly intervention came from a Trump-appointed judge in Florida who threw out one of three court cases still hanging over him following his historic conviction in New York in May.
US District Judge Aileen Cannon rejected federal charges brought by a special prosecutor accusing the ex-president of illegally retaining classified documents, using the novel argument formulated by conservative jurists that the prosecutor’s role has no standing in the constitution.
Mr Trump is due to be sentenced in New York in September for trying to cover up a hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in the weeks before his 2016 election victory over Hillary Clinton.
Two other indictments in Washington and Georgia concern his attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat by Mr Biden, on the evidence-free grounds that he was cheated of victory by ballot fraud.
But those proceedings have been repeatedly delayed, and are now clouded in doubt after the Supreme Court recently ruled that Mr Trump enjoys immunity for many of his official acts when he was president - potentially absolving him of any consequences for inciting a mob of supporters who went on to storm Congress.
Now recast as a victim of political violence himself, Mr Trump appears stronger than ever in polling against Mr Biden, 81, who was on Monday night forced again to address questions about whether he is up to the job of commander-in-chief.
Since the president’s faltering performance in a TV debate last month, the Republican has opened up a close but clear lead in the battleground states that will decide November’s election, and strengthened his margin in Mr Vance’s home state of Ohio.
The race remains tighter in Wisconsin, another of the six main battleground states, where the Republican convention is taking place.
The attempted shooting will likely do Mr Trump no harm when that is factored into the polls.
And in choosing Mr Vance, the former president took the battle further onto Mr Biden’s terrain rooted in America’s white working-class.
Aged just 39, Mr Vance represents a generational shift but no less of an espouser of the “Make American Great Again” cause, and is arguably a more authentic voice for the cause than the billionaire property mogul, professing isolationism with regard to Ukraine and other overseas entanglements, economic populism and a hard line against abortion.
Along the way, he has disavowed his past criticisms of Mr Trump as “America’s Hitler”, very publicly courting his support before he ran for the Senate and triumphing over a crowded Republican primary field with the former president’s endorsement.
Mr Vance rose to prominence with his 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy”, which gave a raw portrayal of life growing up with a drug addict mother in rust-belt Ohio before he escaped to Yale Law School and got rich as a Silicon Valley venture capitalist.
Mr Trump did not address the convention, but is due to give what he claims will be a message of unity at its close on Thursday.
After what he called an Apprentice-style vetting process, he announced his VP pick on social media: “After lengthy deliberation and thought, and considering the tremendous talents of many others, I have decided that the person best suited to assume the position of Vice President of the United States is Senator JD Vance of the Great State of Ohio.”
David Niven, an associate professor of politics at the University of Cincinnati, commented: “To the extent that he can do anything for the ticket, it would be to recapture being the voice of the American dream.”
