As Vice President Kamala Harris re-introduced herself to the nation and laid out her case against Donald Trump, her opponent was, essentially, live-tweeting a political distraction.
“Is he talking about me?” The former president and Republican presidential nominee posted on his Truth social platform about 20 minutes into Harris’ acceptance speech. It was at this point that she moved away from giving her family history and tracing the biographical milestones that led her to politics to pursue Trump’s criminal convictions and civil liability, calling him “an unconscionable man.”
“Just imagine Donald Trump with no guard. How he would use the enormous power of the President of the United States – not to improve your life,” Harris said in his speech. “But to serve the only client he had: himself.”
Trump’s response? To post a supercut of Harris’ interview and speech clips, with captions question “Wonder why [KAMALA HARRIS] Won’t you do an interview?”
And so the non sequitur and spontaneous rants continued to flow from the former president throughout the night. “Where’s the hunter?” Harris spoke about his upbringing in Oakland, California, he asked in reference to the convicted son of President Joe Biden. “Look, it’s crazy Nancy Pelosi looking on, saying, ‘Where’s Crooked Joe?'” he recounted at the end of the speech, as former Speaker Nancy Pelosi was shown on screen clapping as balloons fell for Harris.
It didn’t end there. He would proceed to call Fox News and Newsmax telecasts to “discuss Marxism in America” - trying to zero in on one charge (“Why didn’t he do the things he’s complaining about?”) before circling through various charges. seemed from Press accidentally A bunch of different buttons on his phone keypad while talking.
In a way, Trump’s response last night was a throwback to some of the classic Trump traits that defined his 2016 campaign and presidency: angry tweets, rambling press conferences, sparring with reporters, and attempts to throw something at the wall and see what sticks. It may look chaotic and messy from the outside, but then again, it all worked in 2016 and almost certainly works in 2020. How this all plays out in 2024, against a new Democratic candidate whom Trump has struggled to define, remains to be seen.
And Harris’ speech seems to have had the biggest effect on Trump: shaking up Trump’s tactics, putting him on the defensive and smothering him with attacks he can’t effectively rebut.
It is clear that there are some attacks that Trump is particularly concerned about. At Newsmax, he embraced the reversal Roe v. WadeThen tried to argue for exceptions to the abortion ban because he conceded that “the issue is not tilted in our favor.” He then criticized Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation-backed policy proposal blueprint for a second Trump term, as the product of “far-right” thinkers with whom he wants nothing to do — even though his own running mate, JD Vance, is intrinsically tied to the movement and The architects of this vision have deep ties to his first administration staff or Trump’s team.
On Fox News, host Brett Baer offered Trump a chance to distance himself from the demise of the bipartisan border security bill Biden and Harris worked to negotiate with Republican members of Congress. Trump’s lobbying against the bill came as a surprise to Harris and Democrats after they denied and criticized Trump for lax immigration policy and border protection.
Instead, Trump took over. “The bill was horrible,” he said. “It was a joke. He didn’t need the bill. I didn’t have the bill.” And he took a dig at Joe Biden seemingly at random: “Now Joe is missing. He’s on a beach in California.” He then said of his visit to the southern border of Cochise County, Arizona, early Thursday: “It’s a dangerous place. I was told by the Secret Service and a lot of other law enforcement, ‘Sir, it’s really dangerous here, I I think it’s time to go.’
Trump’s lack of any coherent campaign message contrasted sharply with Harris’ speech and the DNC’s carefully choreographed convention. And while it’s hard to know how important that is to voters, it certainly seemed clear to Trump’s interviewers.
Baier and co-host Martha McCallum looked at each other as Trump yelled into the phone. As Trump threw out his oft-repeated line about the “lots” of millions of people “pouring into our country from mental institutions and insane asylums,” McCallum interrupted him with another question. As Harris has worked to re-engage the support of women, Hispanics, blacks and young voters for his party, does he and his campaign have a strategy to recapture the short-term gains with these voters that polls showed before Biden dropped out?
“No, he is not succeeding, I am succeeding. I’m doing great with Hispanic voters. I’m doing great work with black men,” he said back. “No, it’s only in your eyes that they have it, Martha. We’re doing very well at the polls.”
He then went on to praise Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, who had just appeared on Fox News. “He was very nice and he said he wanted Trump to win. … I think we’re going to have a great relationship with Brian Kemp.”
The praise was notable and somewhat odd — Trump has long blamed Kemp for losing him the state in the 2020 election because the governor wouldn’t support Trump’s voter fraud claims or attempts to overturn the election. Just weeks earlier, during a visit to Georgia on August 3, Trump launched into a 10-minute tirade against Kemp, calling him “a bad guy.” He is an unfaithful man. And he is a very ordinary governor. … Little Brian, Little Brian Kemp. bad guy.”
But on Thursday night, Fox News poll showed a narrow race In that case, Trump appears to be recoiling from Kemp’s personal insults.
The hosts highlighted another topic — Robert F. About the possibility of Kennedy Jr. dropping out of the presidential race and endorsing him.
Trump would not say whether he would accept Kennedy’s endorsement, noting that they will be in different parts of Arizona on Friday. But he launched into a minute-long rant (the entire interview was about nine minutes) about how he thinks both RFK Jr. and Joe Biden have been treated unfairly by the Democratic Party (“They kicked Joe Biden out of the party.”). At that point, the Fox hosts seemed to have heard enough and cut Trump’s interview short.
