After accepting the Republican party nomination from the White House Thursday night, President Donald Trump delivered a speech hammering rival and former Vice President Joe Biden on every front, laid out his vision for a second term and celebrated the greatness of America.
On his vision for a second term:
Tonight with a heart full of gratitude and boundless optimism, I profoundly accept this nomination for President of the United States.
The Republican Party, the party of Abraham Lincoln, goes forward united, determined, and ready to welcome millions of Democrats, Independents, and anyone who believes in the greatness of America and the righteous heart of the American People."
In a new term as President, we will again build the greatest economy in history – quickly returning to full employment, soaring incomes, and record prosperity! We will defend America against all threats, and protect America against all dangers. We will lead America into new frontiers of ambition and discovery, and we will reach for new heights of national achievement."
We will rekindle new faith in our values, new pride in our history, and a new spirit of unity that can only be realized through love for our country. Because we understand that America is not a land cloaked in darkness, America is the torch that enlightens the entire world.
Over the next four years, we will make America into the Manufacturing Superpower of the World. We will expand Opportunity Zones, bring home our medical supply chains, and we will end our reliance on China once and for all.
We will launch a new age of American Ambition in Space. America will land the first woman on the moon – and the United States will be the first nation to plant its flag on Mars.
On the stakes of the 2020 election:
Everything we have achieved is now endangered. This is the most important election in the history of our country. At no time before have voters faced a clearer choice between two parties, two visions, two philosophies, or two agendas.
This election will decide whether we save the American Dream, or whether we allow a socialist agenda to demolish our cherished destiny.
It will decide whether we rapidly create millions of high paying jobs, or whether we crush our industries and send millions of these jobs overseas, as has foolishly been done for many decades.
Your vote will decide whether we protect law abiding Americans, or whether we give free reign to violent anarchists, agitators, and criminals who threaten our citizens.
And this election will decide whether we will defend the American Way of Life, or whether we allow a radical movement to completely dismantle and destroy it.
Biden is a Trojan horse for socialism. If Joe Biden doesn't have the strength to stand up to wild-eyed Marxists like Bernie Sanders and his fellow radicals, then how is he ever going to stand up for you?
On Joe Biden:
At the Democrat convention, you barely heard a word about their agenda. But that's not because they don't have one. It's because their agenda is the most extreme set of proposals ever put forward by a major party nominee. Joe Biden may claim he is an "ally of the Light," but when it comes to his agenda, Biden wants to keep you completely in the dark.
-Jobs and economy:
Joe Biden is not the savior of America's soul – he is the destroyer of America's Jobs, and if given the chance, he will be the destroyer of American Greatness.
For 47 years, Joe Biden took the donations of blue collar workers, gave them hugs and even kisses, and told them he felt their pain – and then he flew back to Washington and voted to ship their jobs to China and many other distant lands. Joe Biden spent his entire career outsourcing the dreams of American Workers, offshoring their jobs, opening their borders, and sending their sons and daughters to fight in endless foreign wars.
-Violence ravaging the cities:
During their convention, Joe Biden and his supporters remained completely silent about the rioters and criminals spreading mayhem in Democrat-Run Cities. In the face of left-wing anarchy and mayhem in Minneapolis, Chicago, and other cities, Joe Biden's campaign did not condemn it – they DONATED to it. At least 13 members of Joe Biden's campaign staff donated to a fund to bail out vandals, arsonists, looters, and rioters from jail.
Last year, over 1,000 African-Americans were murdered as result of violent crime in just four Democrat-run cities. The top 10 most dangerous cities in the country are run by Democrats, and have been for decades. Thousands more African-Americans are victims of violent crime in these communities Joe Biden and the left ignore these American Victims. I never will.
-Law enforcement/law and order
The most dangerous aspect of the Biden Platform is the attack on public safety. The Biden-Bernie Manifesto calls for Abolishing cash bail, immediately releasing 400,000 criminals onto your streets and into your neighborhoods.
When asked if he supports cutting police funding, Joe Biden replied, "Yes, absolutely." When Congresswoman Ilhan Omar called the Minneapolis police department a cancer that is "rotten to the root," Biden wouldn't disavow her support and reject her endorsement – he proudly displayed it on his website.
Make no mistake, if you give power to Joe Biden, the radical left will Defund Police Departments all across America. They will pass federal legislation to reduce law enforcement nationwide. They will make every city look like Democrat-run Portland, Oregon. No one will be safe in Biden's America.
My administration will always stand with the men and women of law enforcement. Every day, police officers risk their lives to keep us safe, and every year, many sacrifice their lives in the line of duty.
-Taxes
He has pledged a $4 trillion tax hike on almost all American families, which will totally collapse our rapidly improving economy and once again record stock markets. On the other hand, just as I did in my first term, I will cut taxes even further for hardworking moms and dads, not raise them. We will also provide tax credits to bring jobs out of China back to America – and we will impose tariffs on any company that leaves America to produce jobs overseas. We'll make sure our companies and jobs stay in our country, as I've already been doing. Joe Biden's agenda is made in China. My agenda is made in the USA.
-Trade:
Biden’s record is a shameful roll call of the most catastrophic betrayals and blunders in our lifetime. He has spent his entire career on the wrong side of history. Biden voted for the NAFTA disaster, the single worst trade deal ever enacted; he supported China's entry into the World Trade Organization, one of the greatest economic disasters of all time. After those Biden calamities, the United States lost 1 in 4 manufacturing jobs. The laid off workers in Michigan, Ohio, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and many other states didn't want Joe Biden's hollow words of empathy, they wanted their jobs back.
As Vice President, he supported the Trans Pacific Partnership which would have been a death sentence for the U.S. Auto Industry; he backed the horrendous South Korea trade deal, which took many jobs from our country.
-Foreign policy/national security:
When I took office, the Middle East was in total chaos. ISIS was rampaging, Iran was on the rise, and the war in Afghanistan had no end in sight. I withdrew from the terrible, one-sided Iran Nuclear Deal. Unlike many presidents before me, I kept my promise, recognized Israel's true capital and moved our Embassy to Jerusalem. But not only did we talk about it as a future site, we got it built. Rather than spending $1 billion on a new building as planned, we took an already owned existing building in a better location, and opened it at a cost of less than $500,000. We also recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and this month we achieved the first Middle East peace deal in 25 years. In addition, we obliterated 100 percent of the ISIS Caliphate, and killed its founder and leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Then, in a separate operation, we eliminated the world's number one terrorist, Qasem Soleimani.
He voted for the Iraq War; he opposed the mission to take out Osama bin Laden; he opposed killing Soleimani; he oversaw the rise of ISIS.
-China:
[Biden] cheered the rise of China as "a positive development" for America and the world. That's why China supports Joe Biden and desperately wants him to win.
China would own our country if Joe Biden got elected. Unlike Biden, I will hold them fully accountable for the tragedy they caused.
-Wuhan coronavirus:
When I took bold action to issue a travel ban on China, Joe Biden called it hysterical and xenophobic. If we had listened to Joe, hundreds of thousands more Americans would have died.
Instead of following the science, Joe Biden wants to inflict a painful shutdown on the entire country. His shutdown would inflict unthinkable and lasting harm on our nation's children, families, and citizens of all backgrounds.
The cost of the Biden shutdown would be measured in increased drug overdoses, depression, alcohol addiction, suicides, heart attacks, economic devastation and more. Joe Biden's plan is not a solution to the virus, but rather a surrender.
-On Illegal immigration and border security:
He repeatedly supported mass amnesty for illegal immigrants.
Joe Biden's campaign has even published a 110-page policy platform co-authored with Far-Left Senator Bernie Sanders. The Biden-Bernie Manifesto calls for suspending all removals of illegal aliens, implementing nationwide Catch-and-Release; and providing illegal aliens with free taxpayer-funded lawyers. Joe Biden recently raised his hand on the debate stage and promised to give away your healthcare dollars to illegal immigrants. He also supports deadly Sanctuary Cities that protect criminal aliens. He promised to end national security travel bans from Jihadist nations, and he pledged to increase refugee admissions by 700 percent. The Biden Plan would eliminate America's borders in the middle of a global pandemic.
-Energy:
Biden has promised to abolish the production of American oil, coal, shale, and natural gas – laying waste to the economies of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texas, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Colorado, and New Mexico. Millions of jobs will be lost, and energy prices will soar. These same policies led to crippling power outages in California just last week. How can Joe Biden claim to be an "ally of the Light" when his own party can't even keep the lights on?
-Education and school choice:
Biden also vowed to oppose School Choice and close down Charter Schools, ripping away the ladder of opportunity for Black and Hispanic children.
In a second term, I will expand charter schools and provide school choice to every family in America. And we will always treat our teachers with the tremendous respect they deserve.
-Abortion
Joe Biden claims he has empathy for the vulnerable – yet the party he leads supports the extreme late-term abortion of defenseless babies right up to the moment of birth. Democrat leaders talk about moral decency, but they have no problem with stopping a baby's beating heart in the 9th month of pregnancy.
-Religion
During the Democrat Convention, the words "Under God" were removed from the Pledge of Allegiance – not once, but twice. The fact is, this is where they are coming from.
If the left gains power, they will demolish the suburbs, confiscate your guns, and appoint justices who will wipe away your Second Amendment and other Constitutional freedoms.
-Entrenched political class
Joe Biden is weak. He takes his marching orders from liberal hypocrites who drive their cities into the ground while fleeing far from the scene of the wreckage. These same liberals want to eliminate school choice, while they enroll their children in the finest private schools in the land. They want to open our borders while living in walled-off compounds and communities. They want to defund the police, while they have armed guards for themselves.
This November, we must turn the page forever on this failed political class. The fact is, I'm here, and they're not – and that's because of you. Together, we will write the next chapter of the Great American Story.
Fresh off of closing out the RNC convention, President Trump will hold a campaign rally in New Hampshire Friday night.
You can read more about President Trump's second term agenda here.