Donald Trump Jr. sells his father as a president who will do the impossible for America
Donald Trump Jr. delivered a real stem-winder at Tuesday night's Republican National Convention, but he introduced himself as "the father of five young children... and the son of a great man." Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, has a "track record of accomplishing the impossible," Don Jr. said. "For my father, impossible is just the starting point," and that's important because "we've actually started to believe that solving our own problems is impossible." America is no longer great, but if his father is elected, Trump said, "we're gonna get it all back. We'll get it all back better than before."
Don Jr. spoke about his father's business acumen, saying the same things that have made him a successful businessman would make him a good president, starting with his "unrelenting determination" and ability to see and promote "potential that other people don't even see in themselves." Trump said that his father made all his children work in low positions at their father's business, and so "we didn't learn from MBAs, we learned from people who had doctorates in common sense."
Trump ended his speech with a tough indictment of Democrats generally and President Obama and Hillary Clinton specifically. He called Democrats "the party of risk," mentioning Benghazi, gun control, "the worst immigration system in the world.... that favors illegals," a dangerous "PC culture," energy regulations, and the Dodd-Frank banking reform law, calling it "consumer protection for billionaires." He also attacked teacher unions, asking: "You want to know why other countries perform better in K-12? It's because they allow parents to choose where they send their children to school." Donald Trump, on the other hand, would stand up for all Americans, "not a class of crony elites at the top of the heap," Don Jr. said, and unlike Clinton, he "doesn't have to use a focus group or data analytics to form a simple opinion." Trump ended with his father's motto: "When we elect him, we will have done all that. We will have made America great, greater than ever before."
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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.
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