CLEVELAND (Diya TV) — House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, urged his fellow Republicans to unite against Hillary Clinton, making little mention of the intra-party disputes of the GOP primary process, instead downplaying them as “signs of life” within the party. He also only mentioned the nominee Donald Trump twice during his prime-time address.
Ryan used the platform to call on Republicans to support a reform agenda. This during a year where voters from both parties are seeking a “clean break from a failed system,” he said.
“What does the Democratic Party establishment offer? What is their idea of a clean break? They are offering a third Obama term, brought to you by another Clinton,” said the former Vice Presidential candidate.
Before Trump’s wife Melania raised questions with her own primetime address that appeared to borrow several elements of First Lady Michelle Obama’s speech in 2008, the first day of the Republican National Convention was dominated by a public feud between Ohio Gov. John Kasich and the Trump campaign and a messy anti-Trump delegate fight on the floor of the convention over party rules.
Ryan, who himself has insulted and scrutinized Trump publicly on more than one occasion, has worked behind the scenes to for months to keep Republicans together. He asked fellow members to use 2016 as a referendum on President Obama’s leadership.
Progressives, he argued, “deliver everything except progress.”
“Only under Donald Trump and Mike Pence do we have a chance at a better way,” he said.
Ryan, as mentioned previously, has not been quiet or shied away from acknowledging the differences in style and politics between himself and Trump. The Wisconsin Republican breaks from Trump on nearly every significant policy proposal the GOP nominee has put forward. No more than in June was Ryan’s delicate balancing act put on display when he forcefully attacked Trump’s rhetoric of a federal judge, an attack which occurred less than a week after he endorsed Trump in his hometown newspaper.
“We’re different people. And we have frank exchanges, frank discussions. He does listen,” Ryan said of his relationship with Trump at a Wall Street Journal event Monday. “I won’t get into private conversations but there are things that I just take issue with.”
He also accused Democrats of playing identity politics, and predicted that next week’s Democratic convention would be a “four-day infomercial of politically correct moralizing.”
“Let the other party go on and on with its constant dividing up of people,” he said, pressing Republicans to expand their reach.
“Real social progress is always a widening of the circle of concern and protection.”
Ryan, who has praised Trump’s performance in the GOP primary, has described the election as a “binary choice” between Trump and Clinton, and argued that any effort that doesn’t help Trump will contribute to a Clinton victory in November.
