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DALLAS — With less than two months to go until the midterm elections, President Donald Trump and Republicans gather in Texas this week for the first ever GOP midterm convention, as they aim to energize the party’s base to turn out in key races that will determine if Republicans keep control of Congress.
Democrats and Republicans traditionally hold large nominating conventions during presidential election years. But Trump a year ago floated the idea of a similar gathering ahead of the midterms, to showcase the signature policy achievements he and the Republicans in Congress produced the past two years.
The president called the convention “a truly Historic Event” and “a RALLY like none other!” when he announced it earlier this summer.
Trump will be at the American Airlines Center in downtown Dallas for the convention’s Wednesday and Thursday evening sessions. Trump will speak on both nights, and will deliver the keynote address on the first night, with Vice President JD Vance headlining the second night.
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The convention comes as Republicans face energized Democrats and stiff political headwinds as they defend their slim House and Senate majorities. There are concerns that the two-day confab that’s been described by GOP leaders as a “Trumpapalooza” may not be the best approach with the president’s approval ratings deep underwater.
But Republicans are expected to paint a contrast, as they use the convention to spotlight the Democrats’ leftward lurch and tie the entire Democratic Party to far-left and socialist proposals.
“This is not a midterm like any other, because we actually have a competition against communism now, and that’s a very serious thing. It’s going to animate voters coast to coast,” House Speaker Mike Johnson emphasized in a Fox News Digital campaign trail interview last month.
Democrats, as they try to win back congressional majorities, were already battling a brand that public opinion polling indicates is extremely unpopular. Making matters worse, the high-profile victories this spring and summer by left-wing and socialist candidates over establishment rivals in Democratic primaries, which gave Republicans extra ammunition to portray all Democrats as extremists.
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“What we’re going to highlight at that convention is the fact that this is not your father’s Democrat Party,” Johnson said. “It’s a contrast election, and people are making a contrast between common-sense solutions and candidates, and really crazy, which is represented by the other side.”
But Republicans have their own issues.
As the party currently in power, the GOP was already up against traditional political headwinds that have historically led to a loss of congressional seats during midterm election years. Add to that the challenging climate fueled by persistent inflation Americans see daily at the grocery store, high gas prices tied to what polls show is an unpopular war with Iran and Trump’s negative numbers.
“Democrats are going to win back power,” Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chair Ken Martin predicted last month at the party’s summer meeting as he looked towards the midterms.
But his counterpart, Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Joe Gruters, told Fox News Digital this summer, “We have a chance to defy history and win the midterms.”
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The victories by Trump and Republicans two years ago in winning back the White House and Senate and holding the House were fueled by Americans fed up with the high cost of living. Two years later, inflation is the Republicans’ biggest liability.
Three out of four voters questioned in the most recent Fox News national poll said inflation had caused financial hardship, while 54% expected the economy to worsen.
“Donald Trump started a war that no one wanted, and now Americans are paying the price. Gas prices are soaring and families who were already struggling in Trump’s economy are forced to stretch their budgets even further while footing the bill for this war,” the DNC’s Martin charged.
But Gruters and other GOP leaders are spotlighting the major tax cuts on tips, overtime and Social Security that congressional Republicans passed and Trump signed into law last year.
“This midterm convention gives us a chance, an opportunity to showcase all the great things this president has done, and this administration, to the American people in a direct way,” he said.
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But Republicans are facing a low-propensity problem: MAGA voters who don’t always go to the polls when Trump’s name isn’t on the ballot.
Gruters called Trump the “best showman that’s ever existed in politics, bar none… He knows how to deliver these low-propensity voters. He knows how to get people up, motivated, excited about the midterms, and that’s what we’re going to need.”
Johnson, painting a preview of the convention, told Fox News Digital: “Two nights of earned media on every station in America. We’ll parade all of our stars across the stage, talk about our extraordinary record of achievement. The president will look into the camera at the end and say, ‘I am on the ballot,’ because we need his base to turn out.”
The DNC, which remains in debt and decided against holding a similar convention, sees the GOP confab as a chance to blast Republicans.
“While everyday Americans struggle to pay their bills, fill up their tanks, or put food on the table, Republicans are hosting a multi-million dollar celebration to satisfy an aging and erratic Trump and tie vulnerable Republican candidates closer to his failed agenda,” DNC Rapid Response Director Kendall Witmer charged.
Witmer argued that “Americans don’t want a ‘Trumpapalooza’ — they want lower costs and affordable healthcare.”
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Veteran Republican strategist Doug Heye said the GOP convention isn’t a bad idea.
But Heye, a former RNC communications director, said “the implementation is important. If it’s Trumpapalooza and ‘America has never been hotter or richer,’ it will fall flat. If they can be focused on what they’ve done and are doing to lower prices, that, along with fundraising, could have some success.”
But he cautioned, “everything we’ve seen thus far suggests the focus will be on Trump, not on the issues voters are screaming about.”
In the midterm battle, Republicans come into the convention with a major campaign cash advantage over the Democrats.
“We have a ton of money to spend,” Gruters told Fox Business last week. “We have the cash, and we’re going to deploy it in a way to make sure that we hold the majority.”
And Republicans aim to pad their war chest, as they plan to raise millions of dollars this week during the convention.
That includes asking donors to fork more than $88,000 for a photo with the president at a private roundtable, according to an invitation first reported by the Wall Street Journal and confirmed by Fox News Digital.
Among the other major speakers at the convention: Attorney General Todd Blanche, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Medicaid and Medicare Services Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner, former White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, and Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son who’s popular among MAGA supporters.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) will be addressing the convention, but his Senate counterpart, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota), is notably absent from the list of speakers released by the RNC.
But a source familiar tells Fox News Digital that Thune will be in Dallas, with a full schedule that includes helping Senate candidates fundraise.
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