What Went Down During President Trump’s Closing Speech At The RNC

Well, after two weeks of live blogging, this is it. The last night of the RNC has come to a close and the main event of this evening was, of course, President Trump’s speech. Throughout the evening, Republicans built on a series of themes they’ve been coming back to all week: The Republican Party is also a party that celebrates diversity and is not racist, there is no room for socialism in the Republican Party, and a “law and order” agenda will be the main guiding principle moving forward.

But as with all things of this nature, it’s really hard to assess what the impact this will have in the polls and on the race. Remember, we’ve still got weeks to go before November, and even though Biden currently has a healthy lead over Trump nationally, that could change. We’re not entirely sure what to expect concerning the convention bounce this year, given the event’s virtual format.

Anyway, thanks for joining us for the last two weeks. If you scroll below, you can see the team’s final takes in addition to the live blog in all its chronological glory. If that’s too much work, though, here are the team’s headlines for the evening:

• Dan: Trump Gives Conventional Speech At Unconventional Moment
• Julia: Trump Eliminates The Border Between The White House And The Republican National Convention
• Seth: Trump Uses White House Lawn And Dense Maskless Crowd To Deliver Standard Stump Speech
• Kaleigh: Trump Gives Nomination Speech From The White House Lawn
• Amelia: Trump Gives Lengthy Convention Speech In Front of Mostly Maskless Crowd
• Galen: Trump Didn’t Make News With His Speech, So The Takeaway Is That He Held A Nearly 2,000-Person Event On The White House Lawn During A Pandemic. (Is That Too Long? So Was The Speech)
• Geoffrey: The GOP Convention Ends With A Bang Full Of Fireworks After A Fairly Tame Speech By President Trump
• Emily: RNC Closes Out With Fireworks, But Not Much Else
• Micah: You’ll Forget About Both Conventions Within A Week
• Meena: Is It Still 2020? (*Somehow, The Answer Is Yes.)

Alright, this is it. Final report card for the RNC:

Address important party groups – Exemplary. By the end, it felt like the RNC had addressed most of Republicans’ key constituencies — evangelicals, law enforcement, cultural conservatives, so high marks here.

Create party unity – Adequate. Two 2016 primary opponents were featured, and a couple of political figures who aren’t directly from the Trump camp. But it’s hard to ignore the numerous speeches by Trump’s close relatives that seemingly took the place of spots for people from other wings of the party or party elders (former presidents, presidential candidates, or congressional leaders). Conventions often feature uneasy truces between different factions and personalities, but the role of Trumpism in the Republican Party meant this was absent, harkening back to a phrase from the notably absent George W. Bush: “You’re either with us or you’re against us.”

Reach beyond the party base – Adequate. There were some attempts – a few former Democratic politicians and a video with former Democratic voters. And there were speeches by people who have lost loved ones in horrific ways that might seem to be a way to relate to voters beyond politics. But it’s not clear exactly how these speeches are received, or if they break through beyond the hardcore political nerds who watch the early parts of the convention.

Command the news cycle – Inadequate. This has been an intense week for the news cycle, and we’ll see what happens after Trump’s speech. Sen. Tim Scott’s speech has probably done the best so far in this regard. The weird stunts on Tuesday night might once have been novel, but at this point they can’t compete with all that’s going on in the news.

Rally sentiment against Democrats – Exemplary. Like the DNC, the RNC has missed few opportunities to attack the other side.

Explain and publicized the party’s positions – Proficient. The RNC emphasized some things that were sort of strange, like the Right to Try Act, which isn’t a hugely well-known piece of legislation. And the emphasis on criminal justice reform might not fully line up with the robust defense of law enforcement. As the incumbent party in the White House, this week the Republicans also made an effort to take credit for the pre-pandemic economy, and to claim successes in fighting the pandemic. It’s not clear these will resonate, or reflect what actually happened. But if talking about “cancel culture were” a policy position, then we could change this grade to “exemplary.”

Tonight was obviously all about the president, but unlike some of Trump’s other campaign speeches, this one was basically like the State of the Union. He went over his accomplishments, which made perfect sense, but the speech was frankly pretty repetitive and got stale quickly. He certainly got his shots in at Biden and attempted to cast his opponent as Trojan horse for the radical left, carrying the “Biden-Bernie” agenda into the White House. I’m confident the speech was rousing to Trump’s Republican base, but it’s hard to say how components of it might shift attitudes among uncertain or independent voters. Also, never again should we have party conventions in back-to-back weeks. Just no. Please.