President Trump campaigned for Republican candidates at a rally in Estero, Florida. C-SPAN has posted the video here. Adam Kredo’s Washington Free Beacon account of the speech prompted me to track it down and transcribe the president’s opening remarks:
Before going any further I went to take a moment to address the horrific shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh. It was terrible. Eleven Americans were brutally murdered in an evil anti-Semitic attack. Yesterday I traveled to Pittsburgh to meet with the families and first responders and I especially want to thank Rabbi Jeffrey Myers. He was terrific. He was terrific. Fine man. We grieve for the families of the fallen and we send our eternal gratitude to the law enforcement officers who sustained severe injuries taking down the gunman. They were incredibile. They were incredibile. They were incredibile. As bad as it was, it could have been far worse and they got there fast. We pledge our resolve to remove the vile poison of anti-Semitism and so many other problems from our world and we reaffirm our unbreakable solidarity with the Jewish people.
That was in the first five minutes. More of interest follows, including a comment or two about Israel, but I wanted to get that down for the record. The AP’s running account of Trump’s rally last night — posted here by the New York Times — somehow omits any mention of the remarks, as does the Times’s own account of the event by Katie Rogers.
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