There were no surprises yesterday when the presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was formally nominated as the Republican candidate for the US election on November 5.
As North America correspondent Farrah Tomazin writes, it was Trump’s vice-presidential pick that was one of the most anticipated moments of the campaign, and it took on even greater significance after the weekend’s events.
J.D. Vance was named yesterday as Trump’s running mate. The 39-year-old Ohio Senator is a relative newcomer to the scene, Tomazin writes, and, if elected in November, would be one of the youngest vice presidents in history.
Vance is a rising star in the Republican Party – a Yale graduate, former marine and one-time venture capitalist whose story of rust-belt America was immortalised in his memoir, Hillbilly Elegy.
But as Democratic President Joe Biden put it, “he’s a clone of Trump”, and the incumbent president did not “see any difference” between them.
Trump appeared at the first day of the Republican National Conference with a bandage on his ear after surviving an assassination attempt two days earlier. He is expected to deliver a speech formally accepting the Republican presidential nomination on Thursday (Friday AEST).
Read Farrah’s analysis of day one of the convention here.