Former President Donald Trump garnered loud applause from the crowd after saying he wants to “buy” the presidency from voters during his Republican National Convention keynote Thursday night.
“By the way, Wisconsin we are spending over $250 million here creating jobs and other economic development all over the place so I hope you will remember this in November and give us your vote,” Trump said. “I am trying to buy your vote. I’ll be honest about that.”
The tongue-in-cheek quip was aimed at inciting outrage from the opposition, wrote author and Dartmouth professor Jeff Sharlet on X.
“Please, anti-Trumpers, don't take the bait,” Shatlet wrote. “He wants you to get indignant. He's trolling you.”
"If you're in one of the groups whose votes Trump is trying to buy with gift cards or sudden flurries of pandering, out-of-character legislation, do what Trump would do: accept the bribe, then vote against him anyway," author Elliott Downing wrote on X. "Insincere transactional relationships go both ways."
Podcast Ralph Malbrough called the joke "100% uncut Trump."
"Also he just got impeached again for trying to Buy Wisconsin’s electoral votes," Malbrough wrote on X.
Meanwhile, conservative talk show radio host Andrew Wilkow chided on X, "Who is going to be the first democrat to say Donald Trump must be charged with an FEC violation for saying "I'm trying to buy your vote?""
Trump on Wisconsin: "Give us your vote -- I am trying to buy your vote. I'll be honest about that"
"
