Turns out Donald Trump’s Republican National Convention is even more of a failure than we thought

| 8:00 pm EDT August 27, 2020
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If Donald Trump and what’s left of his Republican Party were looking to use the 2020 Republican National Convention to boost their prospects in November, they’d be using the national stage to appeal to voters in the middle and voters who are on the fence. Instead Trump is narcissistically pandering to his existing base. Not only is this not helping him, it turns out no one is even watching.

The TV ratings for the first night of the RNC were about 25% lower than the first night of the DNC. That suggested that not many people were interested in tuning in to hear what Trump and the Republican gang had to say to begin with. But the TV ratings for the third night of the RNC have turned out to be about 35% lower than the third night of the DNC. This means that not only did fewer people tune for Trump’s convention to begin with, they’re tuning out more quickly.

Blame it on whatever you want. Unhinged speeches from extremists and criminals. Lack of starpower, with the GOP having so few “stars” to begin with, and most of the better-known Republican sitting the convention out. Embarrassingly low production values. One kindergarten level stunt after another. The fact that these speakers have little to say that the average American wants to hear, and are merely slobbering all over Trump instead. But no one’s watching.

This leaves Donald Trump in the unenviable position of of trying to use his acceptance speech tonight to turn his bad poll numbers and failed convention, at a time when the ratings trend suggests that not many people will be watching his speech tonight anyway. Of course in the condition that Trump is usually in during his public appearances these days, having a large audience watch him fall to pieces is probably the worst case scenario for him.