On a day when stock markets around the world dropped precipitously, Alabama Republican Party Chairman John Wahl led a celebration of the president whose global tariffssparked the sell-off.
With no mention of the Wall Street roller coaster and global economic uncertainty, Wahl declared his state GOP’s “Trump Victory Dinner” — and the broader national moment — a triumph. And for anyone who rejects President Donald Trump, his agenda and the “America First” army that backs it all, Wahl had an offer: “The Alabama Republican Party will buy them a plane ticket to any country in the world they want to go to.”
Wahl’s audience — an assembly of lobbyists and donors, state lawmakers, local party officials and grassroots activists — laughed, applauded and sometimes roared throughout last week’s gala in downtown Birmingham, the rare Democratic stronghold in one of the nation’s most Republican states. The president’s son Donald Trump Jr. elicited perhaps the most enthusiasm with an unapologetically partisan pitch, even repeating the lie that his father won the 2020 election over Democrat Joe Biden.