Donald Trump was booed and heckled by a raucous audience at the Libertarian National Convention on Saturday night. This was a marked change for the former president. Trump is used to mass adulation at rallies from his fervently loyal supporters.
When Trump took to the stage in Washington, there were loud boos and jeers. A smaller section of the crowd cheered him. One Libertarian Party member shouted shortly before he appeared: “Donald Trump should have taken a bullet!”
Libertarians believe in limited government and individual freedom. They blame Trump for rushing through the creation of a COVID-19 vaccine when he was president and for not doing more to stop public health restrictions on the unvaccinated during the pandemic.
Trump is trying to appeal to libertarians because they have more in common with Republican policy positions than Democrats on issues such as taxes and size of government. Libertarians garnered only 1.2% of the national vote in 2020, or about 1.8 million votes. However, November’s election could be decided by just tens of thousands of votes in battleground states. Trump is therefore seeking to peel away some libertarian support in what is expected to be a closely fought election.
He asked libertarians to work with him to defeat Biden, an appeal which was greeted by many boos. This is even though the vast majority in the crowd are fiercely opposed to Biden and his administration.
Trump’s appearance at the gathering is unusual for a Republican White House candidate. It signals how seriously he and his campaign take the threat of third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kennedy who has long opposed vaccines and mandates, spoke to the convention on Friday.
(REUTERS)
