Former primary rivals DeSantis, Haley make case for second Trump presidency
MILWAUKEE, Wis. — Former opponents and critics heaped praise on former President Donald Trump on Day Two of the Republican National Convention — including a powerful plea by primary rival Nikki Haley to support Trump “for the sake of the nation.”
The former ambassador and South Carolina governor, whose entrance was met by a splatter of boos, told Republicans, “You don’t have to agree with Trump 100 percent of the time to vote for him. Take it from me.”
“I haven’t always agreed with President Trump, but we agree more often than we disagree. We agree on keeping America strong,” Haley said. “We agree on keeping America safe and we agree that Democrats have moved so far to the left, that they’re putting our freedom in danger. I’m here tonight because we have a country to save.”
Haley released her delegates last week and urged them to vote for Trump. She endorsed Trump in May, two months after she ended her campaign. She was asked to speak on Saturday, the same day Trump was shot in the right ear in an assassination attempt at a Pennsylvania rally.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, another primary rival, told the crowd, “Americans cannot afford four more years of a ‘Weekend at Bernie’s presidency.” He criticized Democrats for DEI and COVID vaccines — “and they can’t even define what a woman is."
“We cannot let him down and we cannot let America down,” DeSantis said of Trump.
Trump took his seat inside the arena for the final two hours of the program — still wearing a bandage on his right ear from Saturday’s assassination attempt at a Pennsylvania rally. He watched, and smiled often, as his former rivals pledged their support.
With a focus on crime and immigration, and plenty of attacks on Democratic policies, Chicago’s “rooftop pastor” Rev. Corey Brooks planned to cap the night with a final prayer.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Fla., accused Democrats of wanting “votes from illegals more than they wanted to protect our children.” And former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy urged Trump to “seal the southern border on day one.”
People who are not U.S. citizens cannot legally vote in federal elections — and there isn't evidence of it happening in large numbers. But Republicans have seized on the issue and some are calling for legislation that would require proof of citizenship to vote.
"...Our message to illegals is also this, we will return you to your country of origin, not because you're all bad people but because you broke the law in the United States of America," Ramaswamy said to applause.
Earlier Tuesday, one of Trump’s most fervent Illinois supporters, U.S. Rep. Mary Miller took aim at everything from the media, to Chicago public schools and Gov. J.B. Pritzker, after the Illinois delegation’s breakfast.
Miller said the Illinois GOP would have better luck reaching voters in the middle “if the media would accurately report who President Trump is, what he’s done for the American people.”
“I can say one thing to the people, the parents that are in Chicago and their children are being forced into failed schools,” Miller said. “There are three things that give a child privilege: parents that are married and stayed together, faith … and an excellent education, and you’re damaging a child for life to give them a terrible education.”
She told delegates that Democratic supermajorities in the state capitol had turned it into “a bad idea factory.”
“We cannot surrender the whole state of our great President Abraham Lincoln to [Gov. J.B.] Pritzker and the radical left,” she told Illinois delegates. “We’re in a race to the bottom with California and New York.”
Also mingling with delegates at the hotel breakfast Tuesday was lllinois Republican Party chairwoman-elect Kathy Salvi, making her first appearance since being elected last week as the next face of the party.
And a day after Trump announced Vance as his running mate, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin told reporters in Chicago that Vance’s goal in blocking April Perry and other nominees “was to grind the Department of Justice to a halt.”
Perry’s nomination was blocked by Vance to protest Trump’s indictments. Vance also blocked confirmation of the top federal prosecutor in Cleveland. Perry would have been Chicago’s first female U.S. attorney.
“Why would he want to stop career prosecutors from moving forward to protect us?” Durbin said. “He was very clear about it. It was retribution for the weaponization of the Department of Justice toward Donald Trump. It was strictly a political move.”