Las Vegas, Baby! Trump's speech in Las Vegas: He claims it, none of it is true

Las Vegas, (KB) - It is a casino, the Red Rock Resort in Las Vegas, and that alone is the perfect setting. Even before the president steps up to the podium, Republican Governor Joe Lombardo speaks and remembers a fallen officer, Austin Abdelnabi of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. The 30 year old, a Marine Corps veteran, was killed in the line of duty on Tuesday while pursuing a man who had been waving a gun outside a business. Someone in the audience loudly boos, and Lombardo has to make it clear that nobody is booing the fallen police officer. That is how the evening begins, with a boo that misses its target and still hits something. Trump will later call the fallen officer a hero and thank law enforcement, and everything that follows that night stretches between that boo and that blessing.

Then the president arrives, and the first thing that comes to his mind about Nevada is Canada. Canada is nasty, he says, really nasty. He loves the people there, but they are nasty. He is talking about the trade war his tariffs set off. He says nothing about the fact that Las Vegas, whose economy depends on tourism, is suffering because of it. Visitors from Canada, Nevada's largest foreign tourism market, have been staying away ever since his tariffs and insults, city officials say. The host insults the guests and wonders why they no longer come.

Ladies and Gentlemen: The President of the United States: "Trump: Canada is nasty. They are. They're nasty."

That evening, words became detached from facts. That is not the same thing as lying, because someone who lies still respects the truth enough to hide it. Here stands a man who no longer cares whether what he says is true, as long as it works inside the room. The sentences do not have to be true. They only have to sound right. And where nobody asks anymore what is actually true, the act of speaking itself becomes the only reality that still matters in the room. In that state, a claim no longer needs evidence. It only needs applause. Anyone who checks the facts afterward finds an empty space where the proof should have been.

Trump says Melania is a very elegant woman and claims that her movie is the biggest movie of the year. Fact check: This claim is false. While Melania's documentary had the biggest opening for a documentary in more than a decade, it was never the biggest movie of the year and grossed just $16.6 million worldwide.

Barely has he said it before he provides the next example. American exports, he says, are on fire, in the very best sense. They have surged to the highest level in history. The Census Bureau and the Bureau of Economic Analysis had reported the exact opposite the day before. In June, exports fell 0.9 percent to $314.7 billion, and the average over the past three months also declined. They are up 11.7 percent compared with a year ago, but that is largely because of gold and oil, along with other energy products whose prices have risen because of the war with Iran.

Trump: "The tariffs have made us rich." 🤣🤣🤣

He has a relationship with oil all his own anyway. For weeks he has promised that prices would fall as soon as the war with Iran was over, something that has not happened. In Las Vegas he adds another reversal. Prices, he says, have settled down recently, and maybe they need to be pushed back up again. You know what would happen then, he says, but hopefully we will not have to do it. He never explains what he means. The same man whose export miracle depends on expensive energy now openly toys with making that energy even more expensive.

That completes a circle he never names himself. The export record comes from expensive energy, energy became expensive because of the war with Iran, and that very war he has been promising for weeks to end has still not ended. What he presents as success depends on a blood price he prefers not to mention. The prosperity he celebrates is the benefit of a catastrophe.

Then comes the ballroom. To build it, he had the East Wing of the White House demolished. At first he wanted to pay for it himself together with wealthy donors. The costs spiraled, Senate Republicans tried to steer $1 billion for security and military construction into the project, which has since stalled. In Las Vegas he now calls it a major military complex, with things he cannot even talk about, including ports for drones. A moment later he says it will still be a ballroom. A building that is a ballroom and at the same time a military complex, only to become a ballroom again in the next sentence, depending on which version is needed at that moment. If the statements contradict each other, that only bothers the person who is listening and taking notes.

Trump on people who drive electric vehicles: "They have a disease, you know, it's a disease. They get completely messed up. They're driving, then they suddenly notice the battery getting low, and after that all they can think about is that..."

He also turns on the Supreme Court. The justices appointed by Republicans do not stick together, he complains. The three liberal justices never break ranks, he says, and he respects that, although it is a shame they are there in the first place. A couple of them simply do not belong there. He says he would like to fire them. Then he adds that he is only responding to Democrats who want to appoint new justices to offset the three conservatives he himself appointed. Supreme Court justices are appointed for life precisely so that no president can remove them at will. A president who wants to fire justices that no president has the power to fire.

Trump on the Supreme Court: "The Republican justices don't stick together. I'd like to fire them."

For Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, he has another label ready: communist. He is going to lose anyway, Trump says, to Republican Mike Rogers, a former congressman. When the subject turns to Israel, El-Sayed wants to end U.S. military aid, Trump goes even further. El-Sayed does not love the Jewish people, he says. He hates them with a passion that burns in his heart, and there is nothing he can do about it. El-Sayed, who would become the first Muslim senator, rejects the accusation of antisemitism. He says his commitment to the safety of Jewish families is exactly the same as his commitment to the safety of his own daughters. The president claims to know the heart of a man he has never spoken to. He speaks with more certainty about the inner life of a stranger than he does about his own numbers.

Out of Touch with Reality: Trump: "The economy is the greatest economy we’ve ever had by far. The polls are fake."

Only minutes after calling Canada nasty, he praises a Canadian project. One of the world's largest lithium mines is being developed at Thacker Pass in northern Nevada by Lithium Americas, a company based in Vancouver, together with General Motors. Last year, the U.S. government acquired a minority stake in the Canadian company and also purchased a 5 percent ownership share in the mine. Speaking to the audience in Las Vegas, more than 500 miles away on the other side of the state, he promises jobs there. He never mentions the government's ownership stake. Instead, moments later, he warns about the dangers of communism, right after describing how the government bought into a mining company. The communism he warns against looks remarkably similar to his own industrial policy.

Toward the end, he dusts off an old plan he has barely mentioned for months. We are going to pass the great healthcare plan, he says. It is simply called the great healthcare plan. Back in January, he outlined the proposal. Its centerpiece is money paid directly to Americans for health savings accounts. Since then, the plan has existed mostly as a name. The evening also features celebrity guests. Former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson is sitting next to Pawn Stars television personality Rick Harrison and Governor Lombardo. Trump greets Tyson and praises his Broadway show Mike Tyson: Undisputed Truth. He says he has seen many Broadway shows and that this one was outstanding. Undisputed Truth, of all things, in that room.

The human moment of the evening comes from a couple from Las Vegas, a police officer and a casino waitress, who are invited on stage with their two very young children to praise the tax relief on tips and overtime that came with last year's law. While Trump steps aside, their toddler wanders toward the edge of the stage. The president quickly walks over and catches the child, then makes a joke about his predecessor Joe Biden that hardly anyone understands. Even rescuing a child ends with a jab at the man who came before him.

Standing off to the side is the governor, urging Republicans to get off the couch and go vote. In November, he faces Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford in one of the toughest races in the country. Lombardo praises his close relationship with Trump, the first Republican to carry Nevada in a presidential election in 20 years. A decision out of Washington, he says, had threatened the state's solar industry. He called Trump, and Trump fixed it. Trump always picked up the phone, Lombardo says. He is placing his bet on a man whose statements contradict one another almost as soon as they are spoken. Also on the November ballot is Nevada's voter ID requirement, approved by a clear majority in 2024 and now needing a second statewide approval. In the end, what remains is the image of a casino where the house sets the numbers and the facts are politely asked to leave the room.