Straining to shore up Republican unity, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence will urge conservatives to shed their unease about Donald Trump Wednesday night as he makes his national convention debut as the businessman’s running mate.
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As Cruz left the stage, his wife Heidi was reportedly escorted by security from the arena. The campaign struggled to respond to plagiarism charges involving Melania Trump’s Monday night address, finally releasing a statement Wednesday from a speechwriter who took blame for including lines from a Michelle Obama speech in the remarks. On Saturday in NY, at an event ostensibly created to introduce his vice presidential nominee to the nation, the real estate mogul talked for 28 minutes in rambling remarks that – brace yourself for this bit of shocking news – at times tended to focus more on Trump himself.
Trump and Cruz have had a complicated relationship throughout the presidential campaign.
“To those listening, please, don’t stay home in November”, Cruz said.
“What I do know is that everyone of us has an obligation to follow our conscience, to speak the truth, and truth is unchanging”, he said. “Stand, and speak, and vote your conscience, vote for candidates up and down the ticket who you trust to defend our freedom and to be faithful to the Constitution”, said Cruz. For this reason, most of the convention has consisted of people from the Trump organization or Trump family repeating the word “TRUMP” over and over again to wild applause, so the lack of it in Cruz’s speech became increasingly alarming.
“He’s a chicken”, said Eugene Delgaudio, a delegate from Sterling, Virginia, who clucked like a chicken when asked about Cruz’s decision.
The lingering tensions within the Republican party erupted on the floor of its national convention in a memorable spectacle of boos mixed with cheers as Sen. Which may explain why Donald Trump showed up by surprise to the Quicken Loans arena, during Ted Cruz’s speech easily sucking the air out of the Texas Senator’s big moment.
Cruz, who has been a thorn in the side of his own party on more than a few occasions, only mentioned Trump once in his speech.
In turn, Trump tagged Cruz “Lyin’ Ted” and suggested that his father, Rafael Cruz, had a hand in the Kennedy assassination. “Than all of the people who voted in the elections?” he said.
Lotze said that up to this stage of the election, Trump has not presented in a manner that felt presidential, engaging in feuds with other celebrities and presidential candidates, behavior Lotze feels doesn’t do anything to help unite the GOP.
He said that although Hillary Clinton’s campaign for the Democratic nomination has more staffers on the ground than the Trump campaign, the Trump campaign “has the wind at it’s back”.
But Cruz’s hotly anticipated speech, in which he refused to publicly endorse Trump, reignited the GOP’s internal civil war. Eastern. You can listen to the exchanges of the various supporters in the brief audio clip below.
To chants of “2020, 2020”, Republican Sen.
Donna Metz, Cruz’s 2016 Kansas state co-chairwoman, wore a sparkling red, white and blue hat and was jostled in the crowd as she made her way toward Cruz.
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Northampton County GOP Chairwoman and convention delegate Lee Snover said she and others have done door-knocking sessions, and are setting up booths promoting Trump at various summer events. “He’s by far the best candidate”. It was a huge gamble that Republicans will deeply regret nominating Trump. Pence’s anti-abortion and social conservative bona fides are well established, so it’s likely a major part of his speech will be spent assuring like-minded Republicans that Trump is someone they can get behind.
