President Donald Trump used the Republican Party’s first midterm convention to justify the Iran war rather than trying to put it behind him, as escalating violence and spiking oil prices loomed over the elaborate Trump-centered showcase in Dallas.
In a speech billed as an opening argument for the peak campaign season, he defended his record and encouraged supporters to vote as if he were on the ballot. He also debuted a new enticement, promising to reward Republican congressional majorities by giving every American a $5,000 dividend to spend within the country.
But Trump also repeatedly departed from his script to argue that he had to attack Iran to prevent it from building a nuclear bomb. That posture contrasted with his declarations in recent months that the conflict was won and done.
“We have no choice, right?” he said in one riff, warning of possible strikes against another Iranian nuclear facility called Pickaxe Mountain. “Can Iran have a nuclear weapon? Absolutely not. Well, then I’m right. Then I win.”
He also mused that the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint for global oil traffic that Iran has been blocking, should be called “the Trump Strait,” expanding on his efforts to rename the Gulf of Mexico, Lake Ontario and, seemingly in jest, New Mexico. “I should get something out of it,” Trump said of the war.
Hours earlier, he acknowledged for the first time that the conflict — which he originally said would last four to six weeks — and the higher gas prices it resulted in would continue past the November midterms. The global crude oil benchmark price topped $100 a barrel in Wednesday trading as the U.S. sank Iranian tankers and Iran fired missiles at a U.S. base in Jordan.
Trump argued that wasn’t an accident. Accusing Iran of trying to influence the midterm elections, he extended charges he has previously made against prosecutors, media organizations, social media companies, pollsters, China, Ukraine, mail ballots and voting machines.
“The world will be over very shortly after the election,” he said onstage, framed by supporters waving American flags. Iran is “hanging out for dear life, hoping that we lose so they can deal with dumb, weak Democrats.”
Trump cast Republican majorities as necessary to preserve and further his policies, dangling what he called a “Trump dividend” to galvanize voters. The White House did not immediately elaborate on how the benefit would work. As described, the payout could easily total more than $1 trillion and add to the national debt.
Trump also introduced fresh policy pledges to restrict credit card swipe fees and surprise medical bills, without specifying how he would build on a 2020 law addressing the practice. He further renewed his call for subsidizing people buying health insurance instead of companies providing it.
The new campaign promises came as Americans continue to give Trump poor marks on the country’s direction and cost of living. Almost two-thirds say the country is on the wrong track and disapprove of Trump’s job performance as president, according to the latest Reuters-Ipsos national surveys. Almost half ranked the cost of living as their top priority in the August poll, and 35 percent said Democrats had a better plan to address it, compared with 26 percent who said so of Republicans and 28 percent who said they didn’t know.
“This bizarre Republican midterm convention here can’t paper over the fact that Republicans have done nothing to earn your vote,” Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said at a news conference with fellow Democrats earlier on Wednesday. “Donald Trump is hoping that a flashy prime-time event will make you forget that well his trade war is killing costs for families at the grocery store.”
Trump’s answer was to try to shift the blame to Democrats.
“It was them that caused the affordability — to use their word — crisis,” he said. “I’m bringing the prices way down. Way, way down.”
The speech highlighted the Republicans in key Senate battlegrounds just as his political operation expanded its air support by booking $47.8 million in ads, according to the tracking company AdImpact. The reservations were made through a new super PAC, No Going Back PAC, which was formed on Sept. 1. A person involved in the effort said the group was connected to Trump’s flagship super PAC, MAGA Inc. A spokesman declined to comment.
Trump also committed to campaigning in every hotly contested race, including in the host state of Texas, where he urged voters to elect Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to the U.S. Senate, despite extensively ribbing Paxton on his clothes and appearance. Some of the loudest cheers and laughs came for Trump’s attacks on Paxton’s opponent, state Rep. James Talarico, including a fictional account of him vomiting after eating barbecue.
The crowd booed Trump’s mention of Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota). The president tried to suppress the jeers.
The setup inside the American Airlines Center in Dallas echoed the 2024 Republican National Convention, with special viewing seats set up within the crowd for Trump, his family and other notable guests. Trump opened the speech, which lasted 105 minutes, by falsely saying the event was the first midterm convention held by either party. (Democrats held them from 1974 to 1982 but decided they were too expensive and counterproductive by elevating infighting.) He then falsely claimed the arena was packed, when in fact many of the seats in the upper decks remained empty.
An hour before he took the stage, ushers shouted in the main concourse, asking attendees to relocate their seats to a section just off the stage that remained empty — noting that the president would see.
Trump acknowledged that the president’s party usually loses the midterms and again urged his supporters to vote as if he were on the ballot “just one more time.”
Former House speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Georgia) said the convention could boost GOP enthusiasm.
“Phase one, it’s going to rebuild morale among the Republicans, and it helps remind people that this is a team election,” he said. “If this is a team election, we win. If it’s a series of individual races, we could lose.”
Carolyn Atkinson, 66, said she traveled to Dallas from her home state of “New America” — adopting the term Trump recently began using for New Mexico as he floated changing its name, something the president does not have the authority to do. Trump has faced criticism from some Republicans after announcing last month that the U.S. government would begin calling Lake Ontario “Lake America,” an initiative critics say is a distraction from addressing voters’ top concerns ahead of the midterms.
Atkinson said she doesn’t actually care to see the name of her state changed, saying Trump’s proposal was only a “joke.” And she dismissed concerns about whether the party can appeal to independent and swing voters this fall, insisting — as GOP leaders also have — that Republicans simply need to focus on turning out their own.
“We have registered people that don’t vote, and that’s what will hurt the Republicans the most,” she said. “I don’t think the independents matter to us as much.”
The crowd responded with muted applause for many of the earlier, lesser-known speakers, perking up for two UFC fighters and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
Wednesday’s lineup included Attorney General Todd Blanche, who would become the first sitting Justice Department leader in modern history to address a political convention. For decades, department guidelines under administrations of both parties have instructed top political appointees to steer clear of explicitly political events, to avoid the perception that partisanship could influence law enforcement. Blanche’s predecessor, Pam Bondi, revised those guidelines this year.
The Justice Department said Wednesday that Blanche’s participation in the midterm convention had been cleared by the department’s internal ethics advisers and that he spoke only in his personal capacity. He was listed on the event’s official program as “The Honorable Todd Blanche.”
Allison reported from Dallas. Jeremy Roebuck contributed to this report.
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