Trump Delivers First Speech Since Assassination Attempt

Former US President Donald Trump has accepted the Republican nomination to run for the White House in November

Former US President Donald Trump laid out his vision to “Make America Great Once Again” in a speech accepting his nomination at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

Thursday’s address was Trump’s first public appearance since last Saturday’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt. The former president took the stage on the final day of the RNC to share his vision for the future of the United States, in a speech he completely rewrote following the shooting.

“I’m not supposed to be here tonight,” Trump said, recalling the details of the assassination attempt, as the audience began chanting, “Yes you are!”

“I stand before you this evening with a message of confidence, strength and hope. Four months from now, we will have an incredible victory, and we will begin the four greatest years in the history of our country,” Trump told his supporters.

We rise together, or we fall apart. I am running to be president for all of America, not half of America, because there is no victory in winning for half of America.

Trump had initially prepared “an extremely tough speech… all about the corrupt” administration of President Joe Biden, but “threw it away” after the assassination attempt. “This is a chance to bring the whole country, even the whole world, together,” he explained in an interview with the New York Post on Sunday.

Trump’s running mate, Ohio Senator J.D. Vance, addressed the RNC the night before, officially accepting the vice-presidential nomination. During the half-hour speech, the lawmaker and Marine Corps veteran criticized Biden for backing trade deals that “destroyed” American manufacturing jobs and supporting the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, promising that a second Trump administration would only send American troops to war when absolutely necessary.