At RNC, GOP trashes unity promises and instead stirs hatred

The first night of the RNC was supposed to be about unity but instead showcased once again the determination of the Republicans to stir hatred, fear, and discord to improve their chances of coming out ahead in 2024.

The opening night featured thunderous and repeated applause for lies about transgender people, which has become a leitmotif of the GOP’s election campaign.

“They promised normalcy and gave us Transgender Visibility Day on Easter Sunday,” said Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, referring to the Democrats. “And let me state this clearly, there are only two genders.”

Sen. Ron Johnson said Democrats stand for a “fringe agenda” that “includes biological males competing against girls.”

Rep. John James tried to equate it to part of a broader critique of Democrats, saying that they promised to offer the country hope and had failed. “Our daughters were sold on hope, and now they’re being forced on the playing fields and changing rooms with biological males,” James said.

Anti-democracy V.P.

Beyond the anti-trans hate rhetoric rampage, perhaps the worst happening of the day was the selection by Trump of Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance as his vice presidential running mate. He selected the extreme right-wing Vance because he has promised he would be ready, if needed, to do what Vice President Mike Pence refused to do on Jan. 6, 2021 – trash the U.S. Constitution by preventing the seating of legally elected lawmakers.

Liz Shuler, president of the AFL-CIO, responded immediately to events at the convention but in particular to the selection of Vance. She focused on how Vance would help the anti-worker approach of a second Trump administration.

“Donald Trump has a miserable record of breaking every promise he’s made to working people, from failing to pay his workers and crossing a picket line to his disastrous four years in the White House…. It’s no surprise he chose a vice president who will be nothing more than a rubber stamp for that anti-worker vision.”

She outlined the record of Vance, who likes to pose as a supporter of workers. “He has introduced legislation to allow corporations to bypass unions for fake corporate unions, and he has disparaged striking UAW members while collecting hefty contributions from one of the major auto companies. He has opposed the pro-union PRO Act and has supported so-called right-to-work laws in the states.”

Vance, a supporter of a national ban on abortions with no exceptions, including for rape and incest, and a supporter of laws that would prevent women who are victims of domestic abuse from filing for divorce from their abusers, also drew fire from activists in Ohio who know his record well.

Anita Waters, a leader of the Communist Party USA in the state, noted that “Vance is a hedge fund millionaire with no experience in governing and whose campaign for Senate in 2022 was bankrolled by tech billionaire Peter Thiel, the right-wing libertarian who has famously declared that freedom and democracy are incompatible.”

Waters said that the choice of Vance demonstrates clearly the lie that Trump is dialing back on his trademark incendiary rhetoric. She noted that Vance’s “response to the assassination attempt was one of the swiftest and most provocative, blaming the violence on the Biden campaign without a shred of evidence about the perpetrator’s motive.”

A richer, happier candidate

When Trump himself finally appeared in the convention hall in Milwaukee Monday night he was $2 billion dollars richer as a result of stock in his Truth Social skyrocketing after the assassination attempt. Adding to his happiness was a decision by Judge Cannon to throw out the stolen documents case against him mounted by Special Prosecutor Jack Smith.

An appeal of that decision can be expected, but the ruling makes it impossible that Trump could come to trial for those crimes any time soon. It seems the decision was timed to coincide with the celebratory atmosphere the pro-Trump judge assumed would surround the RNC.

Further boosting Trump’s mood was the prime-time address given by Sean O’Brien, president of the Teamsters. It was the first time a major union leader had been invited to speak at a Republican convention. He said the Teamsters were “beholden to no political party.”

After profusely thanking Trump and praising him as “one tough S.O.B.,” O’Brien launched into a speech some said was intended to signal union workers that it was ok for them to vote for the Republican nominee.

One retired Teamster leader said it “legitimize[d] Donald Trump in the eyes of workers.” Tom Leedham pointed out that Trump is “claiming he is the president of working people” and that O’Brien “helps him with that image.”

On the plus side, O’Brien’s message was filled with a takedown of corporate greed, anti-union employers, and neoliberal free trade – all traditional labor critiques – but it spent little time concentrating on points made recently by another Teamsters leader, John Palmer. Trump is a “known union-buster, scab, and insurrectionist,” Palmer wrote in a letter in January after refusing to attend a meeting between O’Brien and Trump. (See related story on this page.)

During the convention, major cable networks aired an interview by CBS correspondent Lester Holt with President Biden. The interview was marked by Holt asking totally irrelevant questions completely out of context. He demanded that Biden talk about how he, Biden, was “dialing down the temperature” and made no mention of any of the violence perpetrated by Republicans over the last four years.

Holt also asked about no issues important to working people. At the end of the interview, Biden asked him to come prepared to ask meaningful questions in his next interview.

Several media outlets broadcast a split screen with the Holt interview of Biden on one side and Trump on the other sitting next to the fired right-wing Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who arrogantly bragged, “Let’s be honest, Trump has already won the election.”

Polls actually show the race to be closer than the Republicans are claiming, with some showing results well within the margin of error. The level of mass mobilization and turnout by the anti-MAGA majority coalition will still be the determining factor in November.