Did you miss yesterday’s Republican National Committee kickoff day? Well, here are the top five things that happened during the first day of the RNC.
That Entrance: If you’re looking for a highlight from Monday night, look no further than the candidate himself — Donald Trump — and his dramatic entrance into the Quicken Loans Arena. There to introduce his wife Melania for her now-controversial speech, Trump walked on to the stage in true WWE style: in a literal fog, to Queen’s “We Are the Champions.”
.@realDonaldTrump makes a grand entrance at the #RNCinCLE https://t.co/aUYikTbReQ https://t.co/ceoOcf87l5
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 19, 2016
A Re-Run Performance: A candidate for First Lady isn’t expected to deliver a world-igniting speech, and Melania Trump’s quick salute to her husband Donald was just fine — until it wasn’t. Shortly after she left the stage, alert bloggers showed that Melania’s speechwriters had lifted a key portion of her speech from Michelle Obama’s 2008 speech to the DNC about her own husband, Barack.
While Melania can’t be held accountable for what her speechwriters eventually produced, the Trump campaign didn’t make the situation any better, issuing a barrage of bizarre responses, from denying that any of Melania’s speech had been lifted, to blaming Hillary Clinton for threatening Trump’s wife. One spokeswoman for Trump even doubled down.
Trump advisor Sarah Huckabee Sanders when asked who should be fired after Melania debacle: "Hillary Clinton."
— Alex Griswold (@HashtagGriswold) July 19, 2016
Convention Chaos: Opponents of Donald Trump’s nominations made one, final, last-ditch effort to derail Trump’s nomination, trying to force the full complement of RNC delegates to vote on the RNC’s slate of rules. Armed with petitions from nine states, Sen. Mike Lee and former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli caused chaos on the RNC floor as they demanded the chair recognize their opposition to adopting the rules wholesale. The effort, had it succeeded, might have allowed RNC delegates to “vote their consciences,” and not vote for the winner of their respective states.
Ultimately, the effort failed: The chair found that only six of the nine states had delivered enough delegate signatures to force a roll call vote, and the RNC moved on, to a chorus of boos.
Paltry Protests: Although Trump supporters turned out en masse for their candidate — even grabbing gallery passes to witness the “Dump Trump” movement’s last attempt at derailing their favored candidate’s nomination — supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement and other anti-Trump causes were oddly quiet.
Aside from a smattering of protesters in Cleveland’s Public Square, and a short but frustrating attempt to shout down Trump supporters at a Milo Yiannopoulos event, the first day of the convention was shockingly peaceful.
Riled-Up Rudy: The first and final nights of a convention often feature the most prominent speakers, and Monday night, everyone from Joanie Loves Chachi‘s Scott Baio to Calvin Klein model Antonio Sabato, Jr. took the stage. But among the famous (and, honestly, not-so-famous) faces, were breakout stars. Rep. Sean Duffy and his wife Rachel Campos-Duffy stole convention hearts with their adorable tag team speech on family values. Benghazi survivors tugged at convention-goers heartstrings.
And someone gave Rudy Giuliani a gallon of espresso and set him loose to talk about national security. The result? An intense and angry speech that focused on the Obama Administration’s lack of attention to the threat of radical Islam. He stole the show and set the bar high for Tuesday night.
