9 Takeaways From Night 3 of Republican National Convention
Fred Lucas /
Delegates were in high spirits Wednesday night about nominee Donald Trump‘s prospects in the Nov. 5 election as they gathered for the third night of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
The night’s most anticipated speech probably was the one to be delivered by Trump’s pick for vice president, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio. Trump announced his choice of Vance on Monday, the first day of the GOP convention.
Delegates formally nominated both Trump and Vance on Monday night. Trump, who has attended part of each night’s events, is scheduled to deliver his acceptance speech Thursday night at the RNC.
Other speakers Wednesday night included the 45th president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., former House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia; and Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., who last year led a successful GOP effort to oust then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.
The convention’s Milwaukee location is significant for two big reasons: Wisconsin is a key battleground state where Trump and President Joe Biden, his Democratic opponent, have been neck-and-neck in polls.
And the Republican Party was founded in 1854 in Ripon, Wisconsin, about 90 minutes from Milwaukee.
This updated report spotlights nine key moments from the third night of the GOP convention.
Jackson: Trump ‘Took a Bullet for Our Country’
Rep. Ronny Jackson of Texas, a Navy doctor who served 14 years as White House physician—including for Trump, Barack Obama, and George W. Bush—compared Biden with former presidents.
“Now I can say I served a president who literally took a bullet for our country,” Jackson said, prompting strong applause. “I have never been prouder of his leadership than I was last Saturday.”
“His warrior spirit and his display of will to keep fighting for our country, even after getting shot down, will go down as an all-time moment in American history,” the Texas Republican told delegates.
Jackson contrasted Trump with Biden, who many Americans—including Democrats—say they fear isn’t up to the job, based on his poor debate performance June 27 with Trump as well as his public appearances and news interviews since the debate on CNN.
Jackson’s remarks likely were drafted hours before the White House announced Wednesday evening that Biden had canceled campaign stops because he had tested positive a third time for COVID-19 in Las Vegas. The president returned to his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, for a “long weekend,” The Associated Press reported just before 6:30 p.m.
‘Heartbreaking’: Kai Trump Recalls Hearing of Grandfather’s Shooting
Donald Trump Jr. came to the lectern and introduced his daughter, Kai Madison Trump, to the delegates and the nation.
The former president’s eldest granddaughter talked about competing with him in golf.
“If I’m not on his team, he’ll try to get inside my head,” she said. “He’s always surprised that I don’t let him get to me. But I have to remind him, I’m a Trump too.”
But she turned to a more serious note, the assassination attempt on her grandfather at a campaign rally Saturday evening in Butler, Pennsylvania.
“On Saturday, I was shocked when I heard he had been shot, and I just wanted to know if he was OK. It was heartbreaking that someone could do that to another person,” she said. “A lot of people have put my grandpa through hell, and he’s still standing. Grandpa, you are such an inspiration, and I love you.”
Trump Jr. returned to the lectern to talk more about how “what once seemed unimaginable became a terrifying reality.”
“My father came under literal fire, as an incredible, patriotic rally turned into a tragedy,” he said.
“On a field in Butler, Pennsylvania, a brave firefighter died. Others were injured. And as those bullets rained down, we came millimeters away from one of the darkest moments in our nation’s history,” the former president’s eldest son continued.
“But we did lose an American hero that day,” he said, referring to Corey Comperatore, 50, a rallygoer who was shot and killed by the gunman. “We wish that he were with us tonight. But his memory will live on in the hearts of his family, his community and the nation that he loved.”
Vance Outlines Biden’s History of Failures
Vance contrasted his youth to Biden’s while saying that the current president—also a former vice president and longtime U.S. senator—has been wrong on most major issues and policies.
“When I was in the fourth grade, a career politician by the name of Joe Biden supported NAFTA, a bad trade deal that sent countless good American manufacturing jobs to Mexico,” Vance said of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
“When I was a sophomore in high school, a career politician by the name of Joe Biden gave China a sweetheart trade deal that destroyed even more good middle-class jobs,” he said. “And when I was a senior in high school, Joe Biden supported the disastrous invasion of Iraq.”
“Each step of the way, in small towns like mine in Ohio, or next door in Pennsylvania, or in Michigan and other states across our country, jobs were sent overseas and children were sent to war,” Vance said in a clear reference to battleground states in the Nov. 5 election.
“Somehow, a real estate developer from New York by the name of Donald Trump was right on all of these issues while Joe Biden was wrong,” he said.
Navarro: ‘I Went to Prison So You Won’t’
“I went to prison so you won’t have to,” Peter Navarro, a lawyer and former White House aide who advised Trump on trade, told the crowd inside Fiserv Forum.
“I am your wake-up call,” Navarro added.
Earlier Wednesday, Navarro was released from a federal prison in Miami, where he did time after being convicted of contempt of Congress for declining to testify to Democrats’ House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack on the Capitol.
“If they come for me, if they come for Donald Trump, be careful, they will come after you,” Navarro said.
He called the House select committee a “sham” committee that demanded he violate the law by divulging conversations with Trump despite his executive privilege.
“The J6 committee demanded that I betray Donald J. Trump to save my own skin. I refused,” Navarro said.
After a partisan congressional committee and a Democrat majority in the House found him in contempt, he said, a Democrat-run Justice Department—what he called the “Department of Injustice”—prosecuted him.
Prosecutions for contempt of Congress are rare. In one example, the Justice Department recently opted not to prosecute Attorney General Merrick Garland for contempt of Congress, although he refused to produce an audio recording of Biden’s interview with a special counsel about his possession of classified documents.
Gaetz: ‘They Can Run Biden From the Nursing Home’
Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., asserted that the president Americans saw at the June debate, and which the media finally noticed, is the same Biden who has been in the White House for years.
“Democrats have been hiding the real Biden for years,” Gaetz said. “We saw people in the witness protection program more often than we saw unscripted Biden.”
“They can run Biden from the nursing home, [Kamala] Harris, George Clooney, Robert De Niro, whoever they want to run,” he said. “We are on a mission to rescue and save this country, and we ride or die with Donald John Trump to the end.”
In talking about inflation, Gaetz joked about Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., who was convicted Tuesday on bribery charges involving foreign entities.
“Under Biden-Harris, inflation has gotten so bad you can no longer bribe Democrat senators with cash alone,” he said. “You have to use gold bars just so the bribes hold value.”
Gingrich Accuses Biden of ‘Make-America-Weak Ideology’
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia contrasted Trump and Biden’s foreign policies and the results.
“Under Trump, we achieved peace through strength,” Gingrich said. “Under Biden, we have war, suffering, death, and a world teetering on the edge of World War III.”
The former House speaker criticized Biden for the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan as well as weakness in the face of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel.
“The contrast between President Trump’s realistic policy of resolute strength in a dangerous world, and President Biden’s policies of appeasement, weakness, and self-delusion may be the biggest difference between the Make America Great Again movement and the Make-America-Weak ideology of the Left,” Gingrich said.
Abbott: ‘I Took the Border to Them’
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said that when the Biden administration took 50 acres of land along the U.S.-Mexico border to process 5,000 illegal aliens a day, he directed the National Guard “to take back our land and wire it shut.”
Abbott said there are no longer 5,000 migrants per day trying to enter Texas.
“Now that the National Guard has wired that shut, on average, there is one illegal immigrant crossing the border at that location a day,” Abbott said.
The Republican governor said that when Biden administration officials refused to come to Texas to see the state of the southern border, “I took the border to them.”
“I began busing illegal immigrants to Washington, D.C.,” Abbott said to a rousing ovation. “We have continued busing migrants to sanctuary cities across the entire country. Those buses will continue to roll until we secure our border.”
East Palestine Mayor: Biden Admin a ‘Train Wreck’
Trent Conaway, the mayor of East Palestine, Ohio, said there was a clear distinction between Trump and Biden’s responses to the toxic train derailment in his small town on Feb. 23, 2023.
The train was carrying hazardous chemicals and its derailment affected 2,000 households and the water supply.
“I know a thing or two about train wrecks now, and let me tell you, that’s what the Biden administration has been,” Conaway said.
“For the longest time the White House was silent, and we never heard a word from Vice President Harris,” he said. “I guess we weren’t their type of folks. No Hollywood elites or Wall Street billionaires live in East Palestine. Just hardworking Americans.”
Conaway said Trump visited East Palestine shortly after the train derailment and met with first responders, local officials, and residents.
“He toured the derailment site. He listened to us and he shared a meal with local volunteers at McDonald’s. His presence was genuine,” the mayor said of Trump.
“After a year of criticism, President Biden finally did show up, his appearance was brief, forced, and scripted. He met with a select few and then left,” Conaway said. “We needed so much and he delivered so little.”
Burgum: A Warning of ‘Biden Blackouts and Brownouts’
Biden’s “war on energy” has raised the cost for every American, said North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, who was reportedly in the final three for Trump’s choice to be his running mate.
“Biden’s green agenda feels like it was written by China, Russia, and Iran,” Burgum said, before specifying the president’s mandate to force Americans to drive electric vehicles.
“Let’s look at Biden’s EV mandates. Where do nearly all the batteries and rare-earth minerals come from? China. The day that Biden halted permits for clean U.S. natural gas export facilities, just think about the party they must have thrown that night at the Kremlin.”
Burgum also ran this year for the Republican presidential nomination, but dropped out of the race fairly early.
“Four more years of Joe will usher in an era of Biden brownouts and blackouts,” he said. “Imagine, no electricity for your fridge, your lights, and air conditioning.”
Under Trump, the North Dakota governor said, America will be energy dominant.
“Teddy Roosevelt encouraged America to speak softly and carry a big stick,” Burgum said. “Energy dominance will be the big stick that President Trump will carry. President Trump will make sure America is selling energy to our allies, versus buying it from our adversaries.”
Ken McIntyre contributed to this report.