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An ex-senior adviser to former President Barack Obama praised Donald Trump’s lengthy, rambling speech at the Republican National Convention as being “good” for Democrats.
“This is the first good thing that‘s happened to Democrats in the last three weeks,” David Axelrod said on CNN. “This really reminded everyone why Donald Trump is fundamentally unpopular outside this room.”
Trump, boasting an ear bandage, took the stage on Thursday night to accept the GOP nomination for president — just days after he survived an assassination attempt at his campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Shortly after he was shot, the GOP nominee stood up and pumped his fist in the air, creating an image that members of his party have posted to underscore how he is a “fighter.”
The widely circulated image came weeks after his 2024 rival President Joe Biden flubbed his debate performance, sparking concerns about his age and ability to defeat Trump in November. A growing number of Democrats, including Senator Chuck Schumer and Rep Nancy Pelosi, have since called for him to step aside.
Axelrod was not alone in his criticism of Trump — or fresh hope for Democrats. A host of political commentators took to social media, agreeing the former president’s unconventional speech should bring a wave of optimism for Democrats.
Although Trump’s off-script speech began by detailing his near-death experience, thanking God for preventing a worse shooting outcome, later on, critics said, the wheels came off.
The rest of his address included his usual laundry list of lies and Trumpisms: the “China virus,” “crazy” Nancy Pelosi, the “late, great” Hannibal Lecter, as well as false claims that Democrats were “cheating on elections” and about migrants entering at the US southern border.
Political commentator Ana Navarro-Cárdenas wrote that Trump’s speech should ignite Democrats: “If this clinically-insane Trump speech does not get Democrats out of their defeatist doldrums, and focused and energized around electing their nominee -instead of tearing him down- I don’t know what will.”
“It was a remarkably dishonest acceptance speech,” said CNN fact checker Daniel Dale. He said he counted 22 false claims made by the former president.
“Tonight’s speech is going to harden Democrats’ spines. The best argument against the party replacing Biden was fatalism: if you’ll lose anyway, may as well lose conventionally,” wroteNew York Times columnist Ezra Klein. “But no Democrat watching that speech thought Trump unbeatable. It was an antidote to fatalism.”
Others compared Trump’s acceptance speech to Biden’s debate performance.
“If Biden gave the same rambling, idiotic incoherent drivel of a speech as Trump, the mainstream media would have a cognitive expert on every 15 minutes calling him unfit and deranged,” journalist Jemele Hill remarked.
“This Trump speech is 100 times worse than Biden’s debate,” one X user wrote.
“If Biden had given a speech that incoherent, that rambling, that undisciplined, Democrats would’ve hit Biden with a tranquilizer dart and dragged him off,” political analyst Van Jones said on CNN.
