Trump triumphs: He’s GOP’s man
‘Dad, we love you,’ says son as votes end a stunning campaign
United for a night, Republicans nominated Donald Trump Tuesday as their presidential standard-bearer, capping the billionaire businessman’s stunning takeover of the GOP and propelling him into a November faceoff with Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Trump’s campaign hoped the formal nomination would both end the discord surging through the Republican Party and overshadow the convention’s chaotic kickoff, including a plagiarism charge involving Melania Trump’s address on opening night.
“United we stand, divided we fall,” said Johnny McMahan, a Trump delegate from Arkansas.
There were flurries of dissent on the convention floor as states that Trump did not win recorded their votes, but he far outdistanced his rivals.
Trump was put over the top by his home state of New York. Four of his children joined the state’s delegation on the convention floor for the historic moment and appeared overwhelmed with emotion.
“Congratulations, Dad, we love you,” declared Donald Trump Jr., his eldest son.
Some delegates emphasized the need for a televised display of party unity after the deeply divisive GOP primary.
But Colorado’s Kendal Unruh, a leader of the anti-Trump forces, called the convention a “sham” and warned party leaders that their efforts to silence opposition would keep some Republicans on the sidelines in the fall campaign against Clinton.
This week’s four-day convention is Trump’s highest-profile opportunity to convince voters that he’s better suited for the presidency than Clinton, who will be officially nominated at next week’s Democratic gathering.
But the rocky start raises fresh questions about his oversight of his campaign, which gives voters a window into how a candidate might handle the pressures of the presidency.
The plagiarism accusations centre on Monday night’s speech by Trump’s wife. Two passages from Mrs. Trump’s address — each 30 words or longer — matched a 2008 Democratic convention address by Michelle Obama nearly word-for-word.
Trump’s campaign insisted there was no evidence of plagiarism, but offered no explanation.
The matter consumed news coverage from Cleveland, obscuring Mrs. Trump’s broader effort to show her husband’s softer side.
Clinton pounced on the tumult, saying the Republican gathering had so far been “surreal,” comparing it to the classic fantasy film “Wizard of Oz.”
“When you pull back the curtain, it was just Donald Trump with nothing to offer to the American people,” Clinton said during a speech in Las Vegas.
Top Trump adviser Paul Manafort said the matter had been “totally blown out of proportion.”
“They’re not even sentences. They’re literally phrases. I was impressed somebody did their homework to think that that could be possibly done,” Manafort said.
Republican National Committee chair Reince Priebus said he “probably” would have fired his own speech writers under similar circumstances and acknowledged the matter was a distraction.
It was unclear whether the controversy would have any bearing on how voters view Trump.
The businessman has survived numerous politically perilous moments that might have doomed other candidates.