“If he gives it, I will not accept it!” Here are some key moments from the four-day gathering in Cleveland.
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But Trump appeared to dispute that on Friday morning, saying Cruz went off-script at the convention.
Hours after accepting the presidential nomination, Trump spent much of a victory lap ripping Cruz and revisiting their primary battles over pictures of Cruz’s wife and reviving accusations that Cruz’s father was involved in the JFK assassination. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told CNN that he “totally” disagrees with Trump’s suggestion that USA support could be conditional. Until now, Trump has failed to make equal pay, or indeed any rights for women, a pillar-or even a small aspect-of his candidacy.
Clinton accused Trump of offering a “dark and divisive vision” beyond what he’s said in the past.
Trump’s kids had less problematic appearances.
In a striking and unnecessary instance of score-settling, Donald Trump unloaded on vanquished rival Ted Cruz on the morning after being crowned the Republican presidential nominee, leveling insults and repeating conspiracy theories about the Texas senator. The Texas senator was booed off the stage after he told Republicans to “vote your conscience” rather than telling the crowd to vote for Trump.
In an interesting twist, there were moments when Ivanka’s speech sounded more in line with Hillary Clinton’s policies than her father’s.
“Somebody got booed the hell out of a place by thousands and thousands of people”, Trump said not-so-cryptically of Cruz. He pledged as president to restore a sense of public safety, strictly curb immigration and save the nation from what he described as Hillary Clinton’s record of “death, destruction, terrorism and weakness”. The tech billionaire declared to the Republican National Convention that he is “proud to be gay”, becoming the first speaker in the party’s history to do so from the stage of the Republican National Convention.
“Is she guilty, or not guilty?” he asked half a dozen times to the assembled delegates.
Adding to the raised-pitchforks tone, Republicans unleashed full-throated chants of “Lock her up!”.
Will the campaign, post-Cleveland see a new, more “presidential” Trump? Here’s everything you need to know about last night’s events.
Trump then addressed the National Enquirer story that included a photograph they claimed was Cruz’s father with Lee Harvey Oswald, another grievance Cruz cited as his reason for not endorsing Trump.
It was the most important speech of his political career and he delivered it nearly exactly as it played across a teleprompter, rarely ad-libbing.
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At 11.34 pm, he concluded with a “God bless you, and good night”. “I think he’s a lovely guy, a lovely guy”. Outside a burst of fireworks marked the end of the Republican jamboree.
