Trump Brags About Convention Crowd Size to Half-Empty Room

“Trump-a-palooza” is off to a disastrous start.

President Donald Trump promised that the Republican Party’s midterm convention would be “sold out” Wednesday—but hours into the opening day, there were still hundreds of empty seats at the American Airlines Center outside of Dallas.

“This place is packed. And not only is this packed, it’s a big arena, not only is this packed, but you have an equal number of people standing outside,” Trump told the arena.

Trump continued to self-consciously ramble about the size of his audience throughout his address.

“This is our big room. This place is packed,” Trump said. “Do you think the fake news, you know what they’re gonna do? The fake news will go around and see that man up there? He’s leaving for the bathroom. He’ll be back in two minutes. Up in the—they’ll take a picture of his seat while he’s gone. And they’ll say, ‘Trump did not fill up the arena. The arena was not filled.’”

An hour later, Trump returned to the subject. “They’ll have a reporter say, ‘Trump lost his audience. He didn’t enjoy it up there.’ I do. I’m having a lot of fun. You know why? Cause everybody loves me, and I love everybody,” Trump said.

Shortly before Trump was scheduled to give his keynote address, House Speaker Mike Johnson told NewsMax’s Finnerty that the arena was full—even as the camera panned over dozens of empty seats.

“Yeah, it’s full. I’m looking around, I think every seat up to the rafters are full,” Johnson said.

PBS News’s Liz Landers posted a video on X of the convention “kicking off” earlier that evening. The video showed that most of the 20,000-seat basketball arena was still empty, with just a few hundred attendees sitting on the floor and lower levels.

“Capacity-wise they could have held this in a high school gym,” former Democratic staffer Aaron Fritschner wrote on X.

Later, another video posted by a Minnesota state Republican representative showed that the entire upper deck of the convention center was empty. Attendees witnessed one convention organizer running through the halls encouraging people to sit in the still-empty sections, The Daily Beast reported.

It might’ve been that long waits in the hot Texas sun that attendees were subjected to kept people away.

Alec Shears, a conservative pundit, described the outdoor check-in. “3 people have needed medical attention so far. Several have already gone home,” he wrote on X.

The Texas Observer’s Steven Monacelli observed that there was a heat advisory in Dallas Fort Worth. “I may have overestimated my progress through the line. I’m approaching hour two of waiting in what feels like 100+ heat and I still have not gotten a credential for the GOP midterm gathering in Dallas. One ambulance has already come and gone,” he wrote on X.

The current conflict against Iran could become another forever war.

White House officials have privately told Donald Trump that the war could last through the end of his term—a stark about-face from the president’s repetitive public messaging on the matter, which has involved tireless promises since February that the war’s end is immediately forthcoming.

Some of Trump’s closest advisers—including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio—have discussed the conflict’s potentially extended timeline with the president, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday. The White House is exploring the possibility that Tehran could continue to resist U.S. pressure, which insiders told the Journal could push the war even beyond Inauguration Day 2029.

Despite the dire reality of the closed-door conversations, Trump has invariably echoed his administration’s forecast for the war to the American public. Speaking with reporters on Wednesday, Trump pledged that the conflict will end “immediately” after the midterm elections in November “because they can’t hold out any longer.”

That drawn-out timeline could spell disaster for American defenses, which have already reached a “beyond critical” missile shortage.

The Iran war has done nothing good for America in the six months since it began. The conflict has so far killed at least 18 U.S. service members and wounded more than 750 others. It has also killed more than 3,500 people in Iran and injured tens of thousands of locals, according to data published by Al Jazeera.

The conflict has also taken an enormous toll on daily life in the U.S., inflaming the cost of practically everything as shipping companies contend with rising oil costs. As a result, Trump’s approval rating has plummeted, with trust and loyalty rattled even amongst his base, who are reportedly losing patience with the unyielding violence.

Even conservatives are skeptical about President Trump’s massive Hail Mary to give everyone $5,000 if Republicans win the midterms.

“Only I can make this promise to you.... If the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them … I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000,” Trump said Wednesday night at the GOP midterm convention. “Very much like a successful company will do a cash distribution to its shareholders, or like last year when I gave our great members of the military $1,776, remember?”   

But not even Fox News was buying it. 

“We should note though, it is not the first time he has promised a cash payment like this,” the network clarified shortly after Trump’s speech. “He promised Americans $2,000 rebates during his tariff policy when that was enacted, but after court challenges to the tariffs themselves, those $2,000 checks so far have not materialized.” 

Fox hosts laid these concerns at the feet of Vice President JD Vance. 

“You do the quick math, that’s about $1.3 trillion,” Brett Baier told Vance. “I can hear the critics’ heads exploding. They’re saying out loud, I guarantee you: ‘The president is bribing voters to vote for Republicans to take over the House. And then he’s bankrupting the country because the deficit debt is huge, and inflation would come back if this comes into play. So how do you answer those criticisms?”

“What the president’s talking about is fundamentally a dividend for American workers. We’re taking in an extraordinary amount of revenue because the president of the United States is actually standing up to both foreign companies, but also foreign countries who’ve been taking advantage of America’s workers for pretty much my entire life,” Vance said, referring to tariffs.

In reality, the revenue brought in by Trump’s tariffs, under $500 billion, would not cover a $5,000 check for every American, which would cost $1.2 trillion. 

It’s obvious at this point that Trump’s first inclination when his back is against the wall is to dangle money in front of the masses. He’s promised cash payments multiple times, including $2,000 stimulus checks for the “tariff dividend,” a $5,000 stimulus check for the bygone “DOGE dividend,” and $1,000 checks for the Affordable Care Act. None of those ever materialized. 

Republicans, by the way, already control Congress. If Trump wanted to make this a reality, he could have by now.

President Trump is attempting to censor late-night TV host Jimmy Kimmel. 

At the start of his show Wednesday night, Kimmel revealed in his monologue that his interview with Texas Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico won’t air Thursday after the Federal Communications Commission threatened him, the show, ABC, the network’s affiliates, and local ABC stations based on “simple traditional editorial decisions.” 

“And so out of consideration for our local stations, especially our local stations, especially our ABC affiliates who would have to deal with this nonsense, my interview tomorrow with James Talarico will not air on television. It will be posted on YouTube instead. It will not be on TV,” Kimmel said. “So if you want to learn about a candidate for the Senate tomorrow, you will have to go to the Jimmy Kimmel Live YouTube channel where you will see it in its entirety.

“And thank goodness we have that, because in the America that we live in right now, that is the best we can do. Until November, of course. Make sure you’re registered to vote, by the way. Because that’s the most important thing you can do,” Kimmel added as his audience applauded.  

It’s an eerily similar situation to what former late-night host Stephen Colbert faced earlier this year, when he also attempted to interview Talarico on his show before the primary election. Just like Kimmel and ABC, Colbert and CBS at the time were threatened by the FCC and its chair, Project 2025 co-author Brendan Carr, and the Talarico interview was posted online instead. The public fight gave the interview extra publicity and it made it Colbert’s highest viewed interview ever. 

ABC is currently suing the Trump administration over attempts to censor Kimmel last year for a joke he made about Trump and first lady Melania Trump. It seems that in his second term as president, Trump is trying to silence dissent without any regard for the Constitution. 

President Trump has made millions on his oil and gas investments thanks to the Iran war. 

CNBC reports that the president’s investment holdings continued to trade energy stocks during the first six months of the war. Between February 27 and August 31, his nine largest fuel assets grew between $1.5 million and $4.4 million, the network estimates, referring to his annual financial disclosure. 

Trump reported owning stock in Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon Mobil, Kinder Morgan, Marathon Petroleum, Occidental Petroleum, Phillips 66, Valero Energy, and the Williams Companies. CNBC calculated Trump’s gains based on what he said in his June disclosure about his assets, looking at how each stock performed over the six-month period. 

The last time Trump disclosed any stock trades was June 29, so the data is incomplete. It’s also hard to get a completely accurate estimate as Trump’s disclosure doesn’t reveal exact share counts.

CNBC stated that it didn’t find any evidence that Trump or his financial advisers used advance knowledge in their decisions, that his finances influenced policy decisions, or that he personally directed specific transactions. A White House spokesperson also issued a flat-out denial. 

“Neither President Trump nor any member of his family has any ability to direct, influence, or provide input regarding how the portfolio is invested or when investments are bought or sold,” Davis Ingle told CNBC. “All investment decisions are made entirely by independent managers. There are no conflicts of interest.”

Still, many of the trades occurred at big moments in the war, such as the first trading day after the February 27 attack or just hours before Trump announced a (now-collapsed) two-week ceasefire.

Meanwhile, Trump on Wednesday declared that the Iran war won’t end until after the midterm elections, adding that he is no longer pursuing negotiations with the country.

It’s bad enough that Trump’s statements and Truth Social posts can manipulate the markets, but the fact that they can also affect his own wealth is a glaring red flag. Trump frequently disparages certain companies and praises others, even mentioning stock symbols at times. He also owns stakes in several defense companies that have done well thanks to the Iran war.  

Even if he isn’t directly involved, Trump knows what is good for his money and what isn’t. The idea that he makes decisions without any regard to how it affects his portfolio, or the assets of his friends and allies, is absurd. He’s already made billions of dollars since being elected president for the second time, and he’s not about to deliberately wreck his net worth.