All the mismanagement and mangled messaging of this week’s Trumpfest in Cleveland has, by any reasonable assessment, made for a rough three days for the Republican Party and its presidential ticket.
But what really matters is what happens tonight, between 10:30 and 10:45 or so, when Donald Trump takes the stage to give his speech.
I’ll give you four reasons to think that all the bumbling to this point could actually improve the impact of that speech for Trump, and by doing so make the Republican National Convention more effective than it would have been if it had been run efficiently and competently.
Unsurprisingly, there were some pretty controversial things said on stage by some controversial people over the course of the convention—things that presumably pleased the core Republicans watching on C-SPAN or the live stream during the earlier hours, but might have disturbed mainstream voters had they heard about it from their regular news sources.
Things like Pastor Mark Burns praying for Jesus to defeat the “enemy” Democrats. Or “victims of illegal immigrants,” as the RNC identified them, testifying to the threat from the brown-skinned enemies within. Or the frothing, Islamaphobic world-view of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and Rep. Ryan Zinke. Or Ben Carson’s suggestion that Hillary Clinton is a fan of Lucifer. (No really, that’s what he said.)
But those regular news sources were too busy telling viewers about the various off-stage foibles and follies to cover any of that. There were so many unexpected stories cropping up: a rules committee fight; a plagiarism scandal; “lock her up” chants; Trump’s curiously timed media and convention hall appearances; and the great Ted Cruz non-endorsement brouhaha.
None of those things ultimately matter much to voters, and they all flitted by quickly one after another. It means that, for most viewers, Trump speaks in a mostly open context, rather than with the (often unpopular) party messages in their minds.
In retrospect, the season finale of most reality shows—including “The Apprentice,” which Trump starred in for 14 seasons—is pretty predictable. It just doesn’t seem so at the time, because the producers use some heavy, creative editing to suggest a closer race, or a bigger conflict, or a greater obstacle, in the penultimate episode.
Similarly, Trump’s speech tonight is unlikely to be much different than what we’ve heard from him before, or what we expect his campaign messages to be—or, frankly, what most presidential nomination acceptance speeches are like. But the chaos and seeming unpredictability of the past few days has made tonight seem much less certain, and thus more entertaining.
That’s not to say that the Trump campaign ginned up all those screw-ups just to build some drama. But it still works that way. And, to be honest, they very well might have intentionally set a few of those booby traps—in particular, the Cruz incident.
Political reporters in the hall were pretty unanimous in describing the delegates as subdued and lacking in energy for the first two days of the convention. Even from a television-screen distance that was obvious, especially as more and more seats turned empty in the late hours.
That seemed to turn at around 8:00 Wednesday evening, following a day in which several of the nettlesome storylines resolved—most notably the plagiarism story, laid fully at the feet of someone nobody cared about—while one big conflict brewed. Reports and rumors about Ted Cruz’s scheduled speech flew around that afternoon. Would he or would he not endorse Trump? Why was he even being allowed to speak? Would this be his opening salvo of a 2020 campaign?
The controversy clearly irritated the bulk of the delegates—both the Trump believers, and the nonbelievers who had accepted the outcome and thought others should too. When Laura Ingraham came out to start the prime-time schedule with a rousing defense of Trump against the holdouts, the convention really came to life for the first time.
Sure, Hillary Clinton is the big villain; but it turned out that having an internal villain was perfect for unifying a largely wary Republican base around the candidate.
When Cruz failed to endorse later that evening, and instead urged conservatives to vote their conscience, boos and angry chants cascaded from the crowd. There have been conflicting reports about whether, or to what extent, that was prompted or encouraged by the Trump whipping team; we do know that, rather than tamping down the tension, Trump’s surrogates rushed to fan the flames across the TV dial. They bad-mouthed Cruz, and even claimed that he had double-crossed them (although it was later confirmed that Trump and the campaign team had seen and signed off on the speech beforehand).
Yes, there are a chunk of delegates who are on Cruz’s side in this fight. But the bulk are now united and ready to show that, unlike Cruz, they are ready to pull together as a team. They are ready to be raucous for Trump.
Holding their convention last is generally considered an advantage ceded by tradition to the incumbent party. That might prove to be the case again. But going first—and the stumbling series of missteps—has helped maintain an important momentum heading into tonight’s speech.
That momentum dates to July 5, when FBI Director James Comey gave his unusual, damning, no-indictment press conference about the Clinton email server scandal.
Sure, it was great for Clinton that she wasn’t indicted. But the Comey news validated for many Americans their general concerns about the Democratic nominee: that she is just a little too untrustworthy, too sneaky, too out-of-touch, too establishment.
The Clinton team can’t do much of anything to change opinions about what happened, and hasn’t been able to control the news cycles to move the conversation onto topics she’d prefer. The Democrats’ convention will presumably do that next week.
But meanwhile, Republicans have been able to keep pounding on that message, along with their other main critique: that the Clinton-Obama team has made the world, and America, less safe.
That’s a theme the Republicans have been rolling out pretty effectively at times, in between the fumbles. And Clinton’s campaign, and the media, have been too distracted responding to the goofs to effectively rebut those charges.
All of which is to say that Trump takes the stage tonight with Clinton cynicism still on the high trajectory it has been at since early this month (as confirmed by recent polling trends). That will make his enunciation of that case more effective, falling on more receptive ears.
