Melania Trump on Tuesday night described her husband as unconventional but able to “get things done,” as the first lady urged voters to support President Donald Trump while delivering the keynote speech on the Republican National Convention’s second night.
“As you have learned over the past five years, he’s not a traditional politician,” she said. “He doesn’t just speak words. He demands action, and he gets results.”
The Slovenian-American former model is among a half-dozen Trump family members speaking on the president’s behalf during a four-day GOP convention that has become mostly virtual due to the coronavirus pandemic. Ahead of the first lady’s keynote from the White House’s Rose Garden, her moment in the spotlight was described as another opportunity to put her 2016 convention speech behind her, after that address mirrored language used in 2008 by Michelle Obama, her predecessor.
“In my husband, you have a president who will not stop fighting for you and your families,” Melania Trump said Tuesday, during an address that ran for more than 25 minutes. “Despite the unprecedented attacks from the media and opposition, he will not give up. In fact, if you tell him [it] cannot be done, he just works harder.”
In addition, the first lady portrayed her husband as providing “total honesty.”
“Whether you like it or not, you always know what he’s thinking, and that is because he’s an authentic person who loves this country and its people and wants to continue to make it better,” she said.
She also said she has “reflected on the racial unrest in our country.”
“It is a harsh reality that we are not proud of parts of our history. I encourage people to focus on our future, while still learning from our past,” the first lady said.
Two of the president’s children, Eric and Tiffany Trump, spoke on Tuesday night as well. Their remarks followed a speech on Monday night by the president’s oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., who said Democratic challenger Joe Biden’s policies “would stop our economic recovery cold.”
Biden’s campaign pushed back late Monday on Trump Jr.’s attack, saying he and other speakers have delivered “dark and divisive fear-mongering designed to distract from the fact that Donald Trump does not have an affirmative case to make to the American people about why he should be re-elected.”
Among the other speakers at the GOP event on Tuesday night were Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Nicholas Sandmann, a teen who sued media outlets over how they portrayed his 2019 interaction with a Native American man at the Lincoln Memorial.
Sandmann said: “I believe we must join a president who will challenge the media to return to objective journalism.”
Ahead of Pompeo’s speech from Jerusalem, the Biden campaign and other critics accused him of inappropriate political behavior and treating Israel like a prop, as his State Department predecessors haven’t spoken at their parties’ conventions. The Democratic-controlled House Foreign Affairs Committee has launched an investigation into whether Pompeo’s speech is illegal.
“Every day America’s diplomats abroad proudly represent our country — not a political party — but Mike Pompeo’s repeated and blatant use of his office for overtly political purposes only serves to undercut their work, and it further weakens the critical alliances and global relationships that have already been so badly damaged by this administration’s recklessness,” said Biden’s deputy campaign manager and communications director Kate Bedingfield, in a statement on Tuesday.
From the archives:U.N. rebukes Trump for recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital
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“The president has held China accountable for covering up the China virus and allowing it to spread death and economic destruction in America and around the world, and he will not rest until justice is done,” Pompeo said in his pre-recorded speech. The former Kansas congressman also praised how Trump has approached North Korea, Iran and Israel.
“If you hate war like I hate war, if you want us to quit sending $50 billion dollars every year to Afghanistan to build their roads and bridges, instead of building them here at home, you need to support President Trump for another term,” Paul said.
The president starred in some video footage that aired on Tuesday night, in a repeat of how he was featured in Monday night’s programming. Trump, who is slated to speak on Thursday night, appeared in one clip in which he pardoned convicted bank robber Jon Ponder, a Black man who has founded a group that helps ex-prisoners rejoin society. He appeared in another in which he was praised as a “champion for women” by women from his administration and campaign, and one video showed him at a naturalization ceremony, where he congratulated five new U.S. citizens who originally hailed from Bolivia, Ghana, India, Lebanon and Sudan.
In RealClearPolitics averages of polls as of Tuesday, Biden is leading Trump by 7.6 percentage points in nationwide surveys and by 4.2 points in key swing states that are likely to decide the November election.
Opinion:Trump, running for re-election, is faking it on the economy and the pandemic
Counterpoint:Don’t count Trump out — here’s how he can still win in November
The main U.S. stock gauges mostly finished with gains on Tuesday, with the S&P 500 SPX, +0.36% and Nasdaq Composite COMP, +0.76% closing at fresh all-time highs.
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