Trump spoke on the first day of the sharply scaled-back Republican National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, after receiving enough votes to win the nomination to take on his Democratic rival, former Vice President Joe Biden, in the November 3 election.
The president repeated his assertion that voting by mail, a long-standing feature of American elections that is expected to be far more common during the Covid-19 pandemic, will lead to widespread fraud.
Independent election security experts say voter fraud is extraordinarily rare in the US.
"The only way they can take this election away from us is if this is a rigged election," Trump said. "We're going to win."
The four-day convention got under way at a critical juncture for Trump, who trails Biden in national opinion polls during a pandemic that has killed more than 176,000 Americans, erased millions of jobs and eroded the president's standing among voters.
Another frenetic day across the country threatened to overshadow the party's celebration, however. In Washington, congressional Democrats grilled US Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump donor, over whether service cuts under his watch aimed to curtail efforts to vote by mail.
One of Trump's closest advisers, Kellyanne Conway, said she would leave the White House to focus on her family.
Then the New York attorney general disclosed in court papers she is investigating whether Trump and his family business committed fraud; both the president and the Trump Organisation have denied wrongdoing.
OPENING NIGHT
As befits the first president who starred in his own reality television show, the four-night event will focus heavily on Trump himself. While his acceptance speech will not come until Thursday, when he will address the party from the White House, Trump plans to appear each night, and several members of his family will deliver prime-time speeches.
The first night's programme includes remarks from more mainstream Republicans such as Senator Tim Scott, the lone Black Republican in the Senate, and Nikki Haley, Trump's former ambassador to the United Nations.
But it also will feature speakers seemingly aimed at firing up Trump's base, including Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a couple from St Louis who earned national attention for brandishing guns at Black Lives Matter protesters who marched past their home.
The in-person proceedings marked a contrast with Democrats, who opted for an almost entirely virtual format instead of gathering in the election battleground state of Wisconsin in a nod to the pandemic.
Biden (77) and his fellow Democrats portrayed 74-year-old Trump as a force for darkness, chaos and incompetence during their convention last week, while stressing the Democrats' diversity and values like "empathy" and "unity."
Republicans said their convention would emphasise "law and order," gun rights, tax cuts and the "forgotten" men and women of America.
The McCloskeys will depict Biden as seeking to protect "criminals from honest citizens," leaving Americans unsafe, according to excerpts of speeches sent by organizers.
Medical professionals and small-business owners will credit Trump's coronavirus response with saving lives and livelihoods.
The president's eldest son, Donald Jr., will also speak on Monday.
Biden's campaign said Trump would attempt to change the subject, delivering "more desperate, wild-eyed lies and toxic division, in vain attempts to distract from his mismanagement," according to spokesman Andrew Bates.
"What they won't hear is what American families have urgently needed and been forced to go without for over seven consecutive months: any coherent strategy for defeating the pandemic."
BREAK WITH TRADITION
With the pandemic not yet under control, good news has been in short supply for Trump. His performance as president was sharply criticised by Biden and former President Barack Obama at the Democratic convention.
Trump plans to hold several live events with in-person audiences during the Republican convention, in contrast to Democrats, who showed pre-taped segments or delivered speeches in mostly empty venues.
His daily speeches are a break with the tradition of the nominee keeping a low profile before an acceptance speech on the convention's final night.
On Tuesday, Trump's wife, Melania, will give a speech from the White House, while Pence follows on Wednesday from Baltimore's Fort McHenry historic site.
Trump will accept his party's nomination on Thursday night before a crowd on the White House South Lawn. Democrats have criticised the move as a partisan use of public property.
"Trump has four days to make two cases: One is 'we know what we are doing and have done a great job, obviously interrupted by the virus,'" said Constantin Querard, president of Grassroots Partners, an Arizona-based conservative political consultancy.
"And then you have to knock the Democratic ticket for being as far-left as they are."
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Comments
"voting by mail, a longstanding feature of American elections "
Absentee voting is totally different from what Pelosi and the Dems are wanting.
We have absentee voting here in NZ, so it's not even unique to the US. What is different is that ballots are not mailed out en mass to everyone on the electoral roll at their last registered address.
They are requested by the voter and you need to provide evidence that you are who you say you are. That is the issue!!!
Would the NZ Electoral Commission engage in such a practice? Even in our placid little country, I don't think so.
The US 2020 election is a turning point for the free world. Will they decide that the 'progressive', 'woke', postmodernist ideology will be the guiding culture of the Western world, or will they say the world has enough oligarchs, political family dynasties, government control over every aspect of our lives, economy and of course the elites, that wield that power.
I certainly hope the deplorables, conservatives and classic liberals see the big picture, then vote Trump 2020.
Well, you have to give him his due, the 2016 elections were interfered with to his advantage, and he is doing his best to rig this one. The last thing he wants is people to vote in large numbers - he needs to stop them any way he can. In reality, there is no evidence that postal voting leads to electoral fraud.
Really!!!
Have a read as to what happened in Milwaukee back in April, then multiply that by 50 states.
https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/04/11/wiscon...
"Out of necessity, the two candidates, Larson and Crowley, are already engaged in transition planning."
Image that!!! Both Dems and Reps engaged in transition planning for the White House for weeks.
Let's hope most of the voters go to the ballot box - or it will get uglier than it already is.
Why you think he doesn't want people to vote is beyond me. His whole presidency has been about cutting regulations, giving people back their personal choice and industry back to the US. There is no evidence to the contrary.
Watch one of his rallies. He keeps telling everyone "vote".
Constantly he says such things as most important election ever, they want to change the constitution, they want to remove the Electoral College and they want to remove your Second Amendment rights.
This election will have the largest turnout for decades, which will make the delayed result even more punishing.
I guess you missed the report published by the Senate released last week disproving your assertions? Also, I guess you missed all of the reports published by the Senate select committee showing the Clinton's and DNC financed the writings of the Steele dossier alledging Russian collusion? I'm sure you are aware of the Duram probe and the linkage to the Clinton's and the DNC for Russian collusion? Funny how you fail to mention that or any of the other investigations into the Bidens, Burisma, the Clinton's or the DNC? Just more Trump derangement syndrome!
This is Trump's usual tactic, create a 'get out of jail' card for when he doesn't get the result he wants. Here is a man who has been bankrupted 5 times (very successful I don't think), is a multiple woman abuser, dances to Putins fiddle and is out of his depth with Kim Jong Un. His own staff have abandoned him in droves. His only commitment is to himself. Only the gullible believe anything he says.
Not successful??!
A quick google search will show you Trump's personal wealth to be around $2.1 Billion US dollars. He decided to become president of the most powerful nation on earth and did so on his first attempt and despite being a political outsider. He is married to a model, and even before becoming President, had worldwide name recognition....Not successful?!....Yeah right.
North Korea have stopped threatening the USA (How many presidents can say that?)
The Putin comment is just silly. Given the Obama administration was working with them on Syria. Russia stopped being the US enemy years ago. It's China they need to be concerned about.
Where are all these women who have evidence of Trump abuse?....Because America, like New Zealand, requires you produce evidence when you accuse someone. None of these women have produced evidence!...Ohh and talking about evidence.......
The usual comment about his supporters being gullible....Well to that, I would say the left has cornered the market on gullibility.....They swallowed the Trump/Russia collusion fantasy, hook, liner and sinker.
Why would you allow mail-in voting in a country that has somewhere between 10 and 20 million illegal immigrants who aren't entitled to vote? Would we allow visa overstayers to vote here in New Zealand? Of course not! So why would we expect the United States to allow that? Don't confuse absentee voting with the mail-in voting that the democrats are proposing. Absentee voting is when a registered voter asks for their ballot to be mailed to them. The democrats want a ballot mailed to anybody who is registered to vote. There are roughly 328 million Americans. The archaic postal system cant handle the volume of mail it curently recieves. How is it going to handle the additional 328 million ballots that will be added to the system? How do you validate the legitimacy of the ballots submitted? Roughly 10,000 people die in America each day, how do you validate that these ballots arent being stollen and used fraudently? The democrats have argued that its acceptable for people to participate in these violent riots; they claim the threat from COVID is acceptable. Yet they claim its too dangerous for the same people to venture out and vote inperson. Doesnt make sense; total BS!