Photo of Donald Trump

Remarks at the America First Institute in Las Vegas, Nevada

July 08, 2022

TRUMP: Thank you. What a group. What a group and what a group we have up here. Bunch of real winners. That's what we need. That's what our country needs. But before we begin, I'd like to express my profound condolences to the family of a great, great man, Shinzo Abe. He was an amazing leader. I knew him well. Tough negotiator. We could use a negotiator like that in our country because it's not working out that way.

This was a man of tremendous moral courage and just a fantastic person. Prime Minister Abe was a friend of mine and ally and an incredible patriot. He was a tireless champion for peace and for freedom and for the priceless bond between the United States and Japan. And his assassination is not only a grievous atrocity, it's a devastating loss for the entire world. We will miss him greatly.

And based on this being a speech about law and order, I hope that the man who committed this crime will pay a swift and steep price for the greatness he has taken from our planet. Thank you very much and thank you all for being here. We very much appreciate it. Together we are going to restore law and order in America. It's what this is about today. I especially want to thank the distinguished guests who participated in the panel today. Former Nevada attorney general, friend of mine and your next Senator, Adam Laxalt. Adam. [points to Adam] Clark County sheriff and your next governor, this man is going to be a good governor, he's tough as hell, Joe Lombardo. And they're both doing very, very well in the polls. I will say that.

I like polls when they're right, when they're good. When they're bad, we don't talk about em. My friend, he is a friend and he's an incredible person, former ICE director, Tom Homan. We could use a little of Tom on our border right now I will tell you that. There's never been anything like it. No third world country has ever had a border like we have right now. We went from the best border we've ever had to the worst border we've ever had.

President of Las Vegas Police Protective Association, Steve Grammas. Thank you. Thank you, Steve. And director of corrections for the Las Vegas Police Protective Association, Myron Ham. Thank you very much. Thank you, Myron. We're also pleased to be joined by so many incredible uh people and we're going to go through them and we'll go through them a little bit rather rapidly because there's a lot of you out there. There's an incredible group of talent.

But uh a person who's doing really well, Republican nominee for Lieutenant Governor Stavros, please. Stavros Anthony. Stavros, where is Stavros? Good. I heard you're doing Stavros. Republican nominee for Secretary of State Jim Marchant. Thank you, Jim. Republican nominee for Attorney General Sigal Chattah. Thank you. What a group. Republican nominee for Nevada Treasure, Michael—Michele. Where is she? Michele. Michele Fiori. Thank you. Thank you, Michele. You're leading in those polls, Michele.

Republican nominee for State Controller, Andy Matthews. Thank you. Republican nominee for Nevada's fourth congressional district, who's doing very well, Sam Peters. Thank you. Republican nominee for Nevada's first congressional district, Mark Robertson. A very non-controversial radio star. He's great. Every time I say something on that show, I get myself in trouble, but he is with us. He's a fantastic guy, Wayne Allyn Root. He's been my friend for a long time.

Kevin Hall. Where's Kevin? Hi Kevin. Kevin Hall. Pastor Darrell Scott, Alveda King. Ambassador Jeffrey Gunter and two very good friends of mine. Special, special people, Mr. and Mrs. Phil Ruffin. He owns his hotel. Phil, great poker player. Don't play—don't play poker against Phil Ruffin. A lot of people have learned that lesson a long time ago. They came to me, "How smart a guy is he?" "He's very smart." "Well, he's quiet. He doesn't like talking." I said, "No, he's very smart." And then they ended up in a big poker match and I said, "How did you do?" "Not well." Phil walked away. Phil, you're a great friend and you've done a great job. Great partner right here in the state.

On behalf of everyone here, let me express our everlasting respect and gratitude for all of the law enforcement officers with us this evening. In the Republican party, we proudly back the blue. Much different from defund the police. And that will never, ever change. We're gathered tonight to discuss what we must do to stop the deadly wave of this is and chaos that has been sweeping across our land like we've never seen before.

The rule of law has been collapsing before our very eyes under the weak on crime policies of the Biden administration, the Pelosi, Schumer Congress, radical left Democrats at the state and local level, and frankly, everybody else. Because people are afraid to be strong and sharp and tough and smart and are always striving to be politically correct. Civilization itself is right now under siege and we can't be just politically correct.

Last year, 16 US cities set an all time homicide record. Murders nationwide reached their highest rate in 25 years and are soaring to levels that we've never seen before. Carjackings are up 200% and even 300% in certain areas. Democrat run cities—people are leaving these cities. Their cars, and what they're doing to their property is unbelievable. Their cars, as an example, are unlocked to prevent criminals from breaking the windows.

Let's just unlock. We don't want the cars broken into. They say, "Take my car," they say. They say, "Take my car and hopefully it'll be returned to me undamaged." How about that? Is that a good way to live? Organized mobs are pillaging small businesses. Chicago is a war zone. Ten people were killed, and you know this has been at the top of the headlines. It's terrible. And at least 62 were badly wounded at the 4th of July celebration this week. And even in swanky Beverly Hills, California armed criminals are stalking their victims' home to rob people at gunpoint as these same victims leave the trunks of their cars up so that people looking to steal their spare tires in the back won't damage the car while they're breaking into it. Can you believe it? They leave their trunks open. Is that any way to live? This is in Beverly Hills.

Meanwhile, our border is in a state of brutal and violent anarchy as people totally unvetted and unchecked flow into our country by the millions. To put it simply, we are a nation in decline. We are a failing nation. We've never had anything like what's going on right now. Our country has been knocked to its knees, humiliated before the world. Yet we presume to lecture other people in other countries on their democracies and all the while the streets are flowing with the blood of innocent crime victims as we lecture others. We will not have a country left if this growing barbarism is not quickly reversed and stopped.

The wave of lawbreaking must be immediately ended, and we must really get this crime wave ended immediately. If we are going to make America great again, our first task is to make America safe again. [crowd applauding] At the federal state and local level, we have to have a change in course, and we need leadership that will let this happen. This is a little controversial and I will either get a standing ovation, and I don't care about the ovation, I care about the country, or people are going to walk out of the room for what I am about to say, but it's time finally to say it.

I did a really good job with drugs on our border. Perhaps nobody is more aware of the drug problem in our country than I am. I worked very hard on it for four years plus. We work long hours and during my years in the White House, we had great success, especially when you compare it to what is happening now, where drugs are pouring into our country at levels never seen before. We got drug use down 18% in the White House with an effort headed up by our great first lady. She worked very hard on that. But that still meant hundreds of thousands of people were dying from the drug problem.

Each drug dealer on average is responsible for the death or the destruction of 500 lives. Each drug dealer. At least 200,000 people a year are dying from these drugs. That's an invasion. It's an invasion. Same as bullets, same as bombs, especially fentanyl, a disaster that I greatly slowed down through dealing with President Xi of China. Had long conversations. I said, "You got to stop it." And he did. But now it's coming in at levels that we haven't seen before, fentanyl.

I've studied all aspects. We've had blue ribbon committees headed up by dilettante, society people and others that are far more interested in seeing their name in the newspapers than in stopping the massive inflow of drugs. More importantly, even if they wanted to, they wouldn't be able to do it. They wouldn't have a chance. They don't have what's necessary to win against the evil and unfortunately brilliant minds of those that head the cartels and other forms of drug distribution. If you look at countries all throughout the world, no matter where you go, the only ones that don't t have a drug problem are those that institute the death penalty for drug dealers. They're the only ones. They don't have any problem. They don't have a drug problem. You understand that, Tom, I never even discussed this with you, but you understand it better than anybody.

China has no drug problem. No, China has no drug problem because they have what's called quick trial, quick trial. Where a dealer, when caught, goes to trial quickly and if guilty is immediately executed. Singapore, likewise, despite the wealth and all of the other aspects that would normally lead to massive use of drugs, has no drug problem because dealers are given, after a fast trial, the death penalty.

Many years ago, China became a drug-ridden country. It was weak, lethargic, and large sections were easily taken over by other countries and the enemy. They had massive problems with opium, as you probably know from reading your history books, and other drugs were devastating them as a country. This went on for many, many decades until their leaders decided it must stop. And it must stop now. It was brutal, but it ended, and it ended very quickly.

When I was with President Xi of China, I innocently and perhaps naively asked, "Do you have much of a drug problem in China?" And he looked at me and said, "No, why would you ask?" He didn't say this, but I'm saying what he was thinking, why would you ask such a dumb question as that? "No, no, no. We don't have a drug problem. Why would we have a drug problem? There is no problem. Drug dealers get the death penalty. The trial goes very quickly. So instead of coming into China, they go someplace else. We've had big drug problems over the centuries, but we don't have a drug problem at all now. They don't deal in China. These drug dealers, they just don't deal in China. The consequences are far too great. It's called death. The drug problem in China, however, is our problem because they make drugs there, but they won't sell them there because they're afraid to do so, so they sell them through our Southern border and other places into the United States. We had a very strong understanding when I was President with President Xi, and he was largely living up to that understanding, and it was really slowing down, but now it's out of control because Trump isn't there. It's out of control.

So we can continue to have our blue-ribbon committees made up of some of the people in this room for very nice people. They're wonderful people, but sadly, they don't have a clue, or we can be strong and do what ultimately has to be done. I listened as one country was being excoriated for having horribly executed a relatively small number of people. But the person representing this country said, "By doing this, we have saved tens of thousands of people and lives and families. We have no drug problem whatsoever in our country." You must also have the death penalty for those who kill police officers, as well as those who kill through human trafficking. Right?

The women and children in particular are destroyed by traffickers making more money than some of the biggest people in business. They are making money that a lot of people, even very successful people have never seen before. If it were money alone, they should be on the cover of the business magazines, not the nice IV League graduates of the wonderful Wharton School of Finance or the Harvard Business School so we can be street wise, tough and smart and end our problem or we can be politically correct, weak and frankly, extremely stupid, which is probably the way we will continue to be and lose millions and millions more people to a scourge, the likes of which our country and most other countries have never seen before.

So do something about it. It's the only way you're going to win. It's the only way you're going to win. Our borders, where drugs come in were very secure just 18 months ago. Drugs were way down and the number of people coming into our country illegally was at the lowest point ever in recorded history. Now, they're an open cesspool of drugs and criminals pouring into our country because so many professionals are here today, and while the television cameras, we got them all, are blazing as they always seem to be when I speak, unfortunately, I thought long and hard about making this statement. I'll be criticized by many. It's a strong statement. It's a statement that I don't think anybody in this room has ever heard. I don't think any of these incredible professionals have heard it said. They know what to do, but nobody wants to say it and I just hope somebody does something. It's a statement that has to be made. The American people will have to figure it out and in the end they will. I am sure, agree with me.

CROWD MEMBER: Trump your supporters are on top. Trump for President.

CROWD: [chanting] Trump, Trump, Trump.

TRUMP: We just want to have, it's very simple, a great country again. We just want to have a great—and we have to have a safe country, have to have a safe country. I also want to thank the people by the way of Wisconsin. I don't know if you heard, but the drop boxes were just ruled unconstitutional and illegal in Wisconsin, and that includes for the 2020 race, which was very close. It wasn't really close, but they say it was close, but now it's not close. It was just ruled unconstitutional, lock boxes, by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin. So you know what that means don't you? Huh? So I just want to thank all the people in Wisconsin who fought like hell for that decision. Going hand in hand with what I've said is that we must give back the respect and power that our police once had. They had tremendous respect and power. I remember growing up, a policeman would walk by, and you respected that person. The mere concept, which is still playing loud and clear of defunding our police, of taking away a liability shield so that when a police officer is in trouble, they have to hire and pay their own lawyers and bail them out, ruin their lives, lose their pension, has to go and has to go immediately.

I watched a major city as water bombs were thrown into the faces of policemen and they stood there and didn't do anything. They were afraid to do anything. They didn't want to lose their job. They didn't want to lose their life. They didn't want to lose their home, their family. They just walked away as water was thrown in their face and that was very minor compared to what's happening now. Police are being shot, killed, punched in the face and they feel powerless to do anything. And politicians are weak, very weak and they're not doing anything to help our police, but I am. They're being shot as they sit in their car, they're being attacked in all different ways. And all of the things that you read today, all you read is about police brutality and how mean and how horrible they are, but that's not true. They're performing a great public service.

CROWD MEMBER: Yes.

TRUMP: They're giving us freedom. Mistakes will be made. Unfortunately, mistakes will be made and you have some bad ones too. A very, very small percentage, very, very small. But our country is a cesspool of crime. We have to give our police back their authority, their power and their prestige, have to do it. And if we don't do that, it will only get worse and it will get worse rapidly. So go ahead and criticize me for telling it like it is. Go ahead and have your fun. Liberal, fake news media, if you want to do just do what you have to do, but we're trying to save a country from actual destruction.

If you want to stop drugs coming into this country and therefore stop a major portion of crime, because a large portion of crime is caused by drugs, you'll have to do what I say and you really have no other choice, but to do what I'm suggesting you do and it's got to be done soon, it's got to be done now. Don't wait because millions of people will die. Just as importantly, if you want to quell the violence, if you want to end the killing, if you want to crack down on criminals and thugs laying waste to our communities, then this November, you need to vote the Democrat socialists out of office. You have to do it. And we know all about the tremendous crime and the statistics which are so bad happening right here in the state. As you know, Nevada is a cesspool of crime. You need to elect America First Republicans at every level. Two years' ago, the radical Democrats and their allies in the media launched a full scale assault upon the rule of law and law enforcement itself. They defunded police, abolished cash bail and released thousands and thousands of dangerous criminals from jail onto the street. They incited a summer of deadly riots in Democrat run cities resulting in dozens of Americans killed and more than 2,000 police officers injured, including one officer shot in the head right here in Las Vegas. You know that you remember that.

But that wasn't the end of the radical Democrat crime wave, it was just the beginning. In every city where the far left defunded the police or attacked law enforcement, violent crime has now surged at numbers nobody has ever seen. Catastrophically, in Washington DC there was a 35% rise in murders from 2019 to 2021, 35%, and that's low compared to many other cities. In New York, it was up 52%. In Chicago, it was so bad. It's a war zone. It was up much more than 60%. In Atlanta, it was even worse than Chicago. I had never known that. You practically can't walk outside without getting shot. It's so bad. The list goes on and on. Just last month, a 20 year old woman was brutally gunned down in New York, shot in the head while she pushed her three month old child in a stroller. In Chicago last week, a five month old baby girl was shot by a savage killer while riding in a car, in the backseat of a car, did it for fun. Killed the baby for fun. In New Orleans, earlier this year, 73 year old woman was left dead after being carjacked by four teenage hoodlums. These were a rough two, these were bad hoods. These were bad ones. She was caught in the seatbelt dragged for more than a block and a half, and was ultimately severed from life, limbs falling off. People watched it, nobody acted except for a very brave police officer. Literally thousands of Americans are dead today because of the nationwide increase in murders since the Left began its defund the police crusade, Democrat run cities, the blood of these victims is almost exclusively in these Democrat strongholds. Babies are being killed, elderly women are being shot in the face and being raped. Elderly women are being raped. Children are being knifed, stabbed and disfigured.

As a candidate, Joe Biden helped lead his party's vile campaign against our police officers and then he carried the rioters' agenda straight into the White House. Biden has sadly pushed to end qualified immunity. You know what that is, police officers? A declaration of war and law enforcement. In other words, let the policeman go out and hire his own lawyer and protect himself because we don't give a damn about them and that's what's happening, and that's what's happening with crime. A man slash police access to surplus. Think of this. We had surplus equipment that I made available and they took it away and they took it back because it looked too militaristic. This was equipment that was sitting in warehouses all over the country. Billions and billions of dollars, it was just getting old and tired and dusty and we were paying lots of rent to probably a lot of friends of government. And I took that equipment and I gave it away to all of the police departments all over the country. Now they're taking it back from the police departments because they think it looks too militaristic. Much of it is safety equipment so that policemen and women can live. Joe Biden signed an Executive Order effectively defunding police departments and staffed his administration with an army of anti-police radicals. Job number one for a new Republican Congress will be to stop this extreme agenda right in its tracks. We want law and order and then we need to elect a Republican president in 2024 to bring Joe Biden's reign of lawlessness to an end.

If America restored a proper approach to policing, prosecuting and jailing, we would immediately cut violent crime in our major cities in half and very quickly under the greatest mayor in New York City history, Rudy Giuliani and he doesn't know, I was going to say that. He's watching. Rudy's right now getting well. He had a big problem, a heart problem. He's at a hospital right now. Can you believe it, what they put Rudy through? But he was a great mayor. He cut violent crime by 58% and the murder rate was cut by 66% in a very short, an amazingly short period of time. What a job he did. He had a strong policy of stop and frisk. You know what stop and frisk is because they don't want to mention the words now and broken windows policing. You know what that is too. And while people don't like to talk about, it really worked.

One regret I have as president is that I let Democrats that should be running their cities do their job on crime. Instead of saying, "I'm going to do your job for you," because we could have stopped crime very easily by being very tough and very smart. I wouldn't do that a second time, I will tell you because we're not going to let that happen to our cities. They're run by Democrats and you know we're supposed to let them run it and they're supposed to be policing their city just like Nancy Pelosi was supposed to be policing the Capital building and she didn't do a very good job.

The mayor of DC, Nancy Pelosi, we offered him the troops, 10,000 plus and they turned us down. That was on January 3rd they turned us down, 10,000 troops, but it's the same thing, they didn't do their job. They like to blame it on others, but they didn't do it. However, when the rioters started knocking down statues all over DC of our great heroes, people that are the greatest of the great, I immediately signed an Executive Order stating that anybody who even slightly defaced a federal monumental statue would get 10 years in prison and 10 years didn't mean three months, it meant 10 years. Couldn't do anything about it, 10 years. I signed it and immediately, immediately everything stopped.

But today crime has become far worse than ever before. With Republican victories in 2022 and 2024, we can restore tough on crime policies and much, much more. Leave our police alone, let them do their job. They know what to do. We have to allow them to do it. Among the first bills we pass must be to fund a massive increase in the number of police officers in every city and Metro area all across our country and we want to get really good, powerful people. We want to get police that can be police. We don't want to hire people that they look at somebody and they're afraid.

Does anybody understand what I'm saying? Do you understand that Tom Homan? I don't think so, Tom, right? Police departments continue to hemorrhage officers in record numbers, a direct result of the Democrat party's anti-police crusade, and by the way, it continues, they still want to defund the police. You know, they're trying to say, "Well, not really. Not really." When somebody's saying not really, that means they want to do it. It goes on.

A Republican Congress should help local communities hire tens of thousands of new police officers and we will. That includes funding to ensure cutting edge recruitment, training and retention with high salaries, benefits and retirement plans because if we don't have police officers, our cities will quickly become even more of a living hell than they are right now. I mean just take a look at the numbers. I thought Chicago was the worst and then I looked at the numbers from Atlanta. I just said, "It's just unbelievable." This isn't our country. This is not the United States of America.

Furthermore, we need to stop conducting persecutions of officers who make honest mistakes and once again, stand behind our brave heroes in blue. We have to stand behind them. We must back them up so they can properly do their job. Police officers will never be able to enforce the law if simply doing their jobs can land them in jail, take away their retirement and basically ruin their lives and the lives of their family. There's a major reason why in states all across the nation arrests have plummeted by 30 to 50%. They see people robbing stores and they don't want to do anything because they don't want to lose their job. It's gone insane. Under Republican Congress, we should pass legislation strengthening qualified immunity and other protections for police officers. Our law enforcement men and women do their duty to protect our country and we must do our duty to protect them and we have to start immediately. Not later, immediately.

You'll start in November by electing great America first Republicans. It's very important. That also means giving them back their surplus military equipment. We want it to go back to them. In addition, we have to dismantle every single street gang, cartel and violent criminal organization operating in America. Prosecutors, no easy job, have to go after these violent criminals and really mean it. In many cases, however, racist prosecutors should also be vigorously investigated for their brazen violation of federal civil rights laws.

It's happening to me with a racist attorney general in New York who campaigned solely on the fact that she would get Donald Trump, "I'm going to get him." You know nothing about me. I said, "Who is this woman? She crazy?" A little bit. No, a lot. It's been going on for years as violent crime got worse and worse and worse. They devote their time and energy, "We're going to get Donald Trump." They've been trying a long time, haven't they? Likewise, Biden has established committees to go after Republicans and it seems as though the Justice Department and even local and state prosecutors have become weaponized. They're after politicians, not the people that are murdering people on the streets. Just like a third world dictatorship Democrats only see the law as a weapon to persecute their political opponents while they let rapists and murderers go free. Instead of going after Republicans and Conservatives and others, they should be focused on taking down the gangs and the killers, the murderers, and instead of going after law abiding gun owners, they should be going after the felons and career criminals with guns, enforcing existing federal statutes to get them behind bars. And they are existing right now, very strong statutes. We have got to get away from these political witch hunts and start focusing on making America great again, that's what we want to do.

We have to stop fighting with each other and unify. That was happening during the greatest period, I believe, in our country's history in many ways, just before COVID came in from China and that's where it came from. Wuhan, it came from Wuhan. It can happen again. We were more unified just before that, everybody was happy. Everybody had jobs. Everybody was making more money than they ever made before, African American, Hispanic, American, everybody, men, women, kids with no diploma, kids with a high school diploma and kids that just graduated from MIT, first in that class, they were all making money. There was nothing like it.

And then we had the horrible plague come in from China. Boy, oh boy, what they cost the world, $60 trillion they say, what they cost the world and that's the least of it. All the deaths, everybody in this room knows probably many people that died. It came in from China. Finally, we have to end the travesty on our Southern border once and for all. We handed Biden the most secure border in history and he turned it into the greatest border disaster in history very quickly. Well, don't forget, on another subject, 16 months ago we were energy independent. We were soon going to be energy dominant. We were soon going to be so dominant that we would be double the energy dominant. We were soon going to be so dominant that we would be double the size of Russia and Saudi Arabia combined. And now, we're going to Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and anybody else to see if we can have oil. And then we took 5 million gallons, 5 million barrels of oil. You saw that this week? And who did we send it to? China. And they had plenty of oil. They're getting it from Iran. They didn't buy it from Iran when I was president. I said, "If you do that, we're not going to deal with you anymore." And Iran was ready to make a deal. I would've had a deal done within one week after the election if the election wasn't rigged.

We completed almost all of the wall. We completed almost all of the wall despite two and a half years of litigation. And it had a tremendous impact that's why our numbers were so good. And Mexico helped us too. I said to the president, who I like very much, that, "You have to help us. People are pouring through Mexico, into our country. We need 28,000 soldiers and we're not going to pay for em." And I said, "If you don't do that, we're going to have to put tariffs on your products that come into our country." 32% of our cars, can you believe it? They took that away from us over the years, over decades. And uh they never would've even thought of it. But when I said, "We're going to charge you 25% tariff on every product that comes in from Mexico," they said, "We would love to provide you with 28,000 soldiers. It would be our civic duty."

But now every day, criminals, murderers, and sexual predators are pouring across our wide-open border. Nobody talks to them. Nobody knows from where they come. Other countries are emptying out their prisons and sending the worst of the worst into the United States of America. Under Republican president, we need to resume the process of rapidly deporting criminal, illegal aliens and non-citizens from our country. We have to get them out.

ICE, ICE. These heroes of ICE and border patrol. Tom can tell you these are great people. These are people doing jobs. I see some of my friends in the front row. I know them very well. They don't want to be an ICE officer. They don't want to fight. They don't want to fight these people because these people can fight back. But these are brave people that love our country. They've done an incredible job, Tom. Right? And they don't get the kind of due that they should, except from you, when you go on and a couple of our friends. But they uh, this man, he's central casting to start off with, right? You look at him, he's central. I watch him. I say, "That's the way. That's the way you got to look when you're going to win." But he knew what he did. I mean, he just knew beyond the look, the look, the hell with the look. He had this right up here and he knew what he was doing. And we set numbers that nobody thought possible, but those numbers were obliterated almost immediately. Come on up and come into our country. Everybody just said, "Let's go." Last month, Tom, we had 141 different countries represented. Most people don't even know how many countries there are. They'd say there aren't 141. There are actually a lot more than that. But we had 141 last month coming into our—people pouring across the border from 140—not just Mexico and Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras. No. You think that—no, 141 different countries.

At the same time, Congress must fund a major increase in the number of ICE officers. These are great people and accelerate this process to get the gangs out of our country. We want to take the gangs out of our country. Nobody who comes to our country from abroad should be allowed to stay if they commit a crime. We are people that are killing people and they're allowed to stay in our country. It's crazy.

These are just a few of the crucial reforms that can restore law and order in America and really, very quickly. But remember, none of this will happen if we do not get America first Republicans elected to office and that's in particular, I'm talking about these people. These are great people. And the people that I named in the audience that are doing so well and campaigning so hard and looking so good right here in Nevada. You have to vote out two radical Democratic extremists who have been a catastrophe for public safety. And for your state, a catastrophe.

Your far-left governor. He was the head of the Democrat party. Now he's governor. Guess what? You think he cheats on elections? Oh really? Steve Sisolak has signed a weak. [crowd booing] Think of this. He signed literally one week on crime bill after another. One after another letting burglars and career criminals avoid jail time, releasing them on the streets, slashing penalties for drug dealers and human traffickers, blocking police from arresting criminals for misdemeanor offenses, gutting bail requirements, and much, much more. He's letting your state go to hell. This November, you need to replace your radical left governor with a true American Patriot. And that Sheriff Joe Lombardo. He's a Patriot. And he's a tough cookie. Joe has been a great sheriff and leader of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. He plays no games. And you can't play games. You got to stop playing the games. Those days are over because our country is really, really in bad shape.

Under his steady hand, Las Vegas successfully contained the left-wing riots of 2020, preventing untold damage and destruction. He played a tough—Joe will be very strong on crime, strong on borders and very strong on election integrity. And he will always be loyal to our police officers. I think I can get him to acknowledge that, right? [turns to Joe Lambardo]

Always because he has won himself. So, everyone get out there and vote for Joe. He's an incredible guy. In addition, Nevada voters, need to fire your radical Democrat Senator Catherine Cortez Masto. She's an open borders fanatic. She's a fanatic. Let everyone come in and destroy our country. She voted against legislation to preserve Title 42. You know what that is? A disaster by doing that. Triggering a flood of illegal migration like our country has never seen before. She had no idea what she was doing. And if she did, that's even worse. She voted in favor of sanctuary cities. She voted against prioritizing the arrest of dangers, criminal aliens and she strongly opposed the border wall. She's one of the many Democrats that sued me. Two and a half years of lawsuits. I had to win. I won 11 lawsuits against Democrats. And we got it built. This atrocious record is part of why so many police groups have withdrawn their support from Cortez Masto and they've endorsed an outstanding conservative leader who's a fantastic guy with a fantastic family who has been with us every step of the way. That's Adam Laxalt. Adam was an exceptional attorney general. He really was a great attorney general of your state of Nevada taking the fight to human traffickers, battling big pharma and opioid, pushes like nobody's ever done before. Leading the resistance to Obama's unconstitutional outreach, including on immigration where anybody can come in and take over your home. So, Nevada get out and vote for Adam, an outstanding person, great person.

Law and order is at the very heart of the American promise of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Without law and order, there is no justice, there is no safety, there is no prosperity, and there is no freedom. That's why impartial rule of law has been at the core of our Make America Great Again movement. Greatest movement in the history of our country and all of those people back there, they would love to get me in that, but they can't. There's never been a movement like this. I mean, we had a president who ran twice and won twice, and may have to do it a third time. Can you believe that? I say ran twice and did better the second time. You know that, right? Did a lot better. Got more votes than any sitting president in history. And that's a tribute to you. More than a tribute to me. That's a tribute to you. And our vision for America could not be more different from the nightmare being forced on this nation by the radical left. They want open borders. We want strong borders. They want to defund and disparage the police. We want to support and strengthen our police. They want America to be a sanctuary for dangerous criminal aliens. We want our country to be a sanctuary for hardworking people that love America. They want a country that is soft on violent felons. We want communities and we want a country that's safe for law abiding citizens of every race, religion, color and creed. These are the contrasts that will define this election. Very simple.

In addition to the other things, I say, low taxes, strong, strong military. We rebuilt our military. We added space force. Few regulations, which is why we had the best job numbers ever. But these are decisions that will determine the future of our country.

With the help of everyone here today, we are going to keep on pushing and keep on fighting until we have defeated the radical left assault on law and order, and we will all together make America great again. We will liberate our communities from the scourge of crime. We will protect the innocent. We will deliver justice to the guilty and we will defend our police in every city, every suburb, and every community, all across our land. I just want to thank you all for being—this an incredible group of people. Thank you very much. We love your state and please go out and vote for these people and these people. Thank you. Thank you very much. Great honor. Thank you.

NOTE: Former President Trump spoke at the Treasure Island Resort and Casino at approximately 6:00 pm.

Donald J. Trump (1st Term), Remarks at the America First Institute in Las Vegas, Nevada Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/374940

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