Two prominent Democrat political analysts suggested that former President Donald Trump's convention speech will prove to be a good thing for their party heading into the final months before the November election.
At the Republican National Convention on Thursday night, Trump called for peace, prosperity, and a return of the American dream in his official acceptance speech as the GOP presidential nominee.
However, David Axelrod, former chief strategist for Barack Obama's presidential campaigns, said Democrats will benefit from Trump going off script during the speech.
"People I'm sure responded very positively to his appeal for unity that were written on the teleprompter and then he just ripped the bejesus out of everybody," Axelrod said on CNN. "All his political enemies and so on.
"This is the first good thing that's happened to Democrats in the last three weeks. This really reminded everyone why Donald Trump is fundamentally unpopular outside this room."
The past several weeks have been consumed by many Democrats calling for 81-year-old President Joe Biden to end his reelection campaign after a disastrous debate performance, and then the assassination attempt on Trump in Pennsylvania.
Axelrod had been critical of Biden's campaign and then joined other Democrats in calling for the president to step aside as the party's nominee.
Van Jones, a former Obama administration official, agreed with Axelrod that Trump's speech was something Democrats will use against the former president.
"He had the whole world in his hands. If he had just stayed with that unity message, he might have caused some problems. He just could not help himself," Jones said on CNN.
"If Biden had given a speech that incoherent, that rambling, that undisciplined, Democrats would have hit Biden with a tranquilizing dart and dragged him off."
Jones added that Trump's speech returned things to "a normal campaign dynamic."
"Trump took what was the most energetic convention, and he was boring. He took the most disciplined convention, he was undisciplined – he basically was the worst part of his own convention," Jones said. "So, that actually is the first good thing that's happened to Democrats."
Jones also said Trump showed his true colors the longer he went on speaking.
"Ten minutes of unity talk off a teleprompter followed by rabid attacks on Nancy Pelosi, on Joe Biden and talking about Hannibal Lecter, that is not a new Trump," Jones said.
"They made a big mistake by overselling this transformation. There has been no transformation. This is Donald Trump, and welcome back to the campaign."
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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