Trump, accustomed to friendly crowds, confronts repeated booing during Libertarian convention speech

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

59% : Despite the raucous atmosphere, Trump continued to press on with his speech, saying he'd come "to extend a hand of friendship" in common opposition to Biden.
55% : About two hours before the former president's arrival, Libertarian organizers asked Trump supporters in the crowd to vacate the first four rows.
54% : After his speech, Rectenwald and other Libertarian White House hopefuls took the stage to scoff at Trump and his speech.
52% : That prompted a chant of "We want Trump!" from supporters, but more cries of "End the Fed!" -- a common refrain from Libertarians who oppose the Federal Reserve.
51% : It was a rare moment of Trump coming face-to-face with open detractors, which is highly unusual for someone accustomed to staging rallies in front of ever-adoring crowds.Libertarians, who prioritize small government and individual freedoms, are often skeptical of the former president, and his invitation to address the convention has divided the party.
48% : One of the candidates vying for the Libertarian presidential nomination, Michael Rectenwald, declared from the stage before the former president arrived that "none of us are great fans of Donald Trump."
42% : Kevin Munoz, a spokesperson for Biden's reelection campaign, slammed Trump and top Republicans for opposing access to abortion and supporting limits on civil society, saying in a statement Saturday, that "freedom isn't free in Trump's Republican Party and this weekend will be just one more reminder of that."
36% : Trump didn't dwell on Kennedy on Saturday night.
35% : That was designed to energize Libertarian activists who believe government investigators overreached in building their case against Silk Road, and who generally oppose criminal drug policies more broadly.
31% : The Libertarian split over Trump was reflected by Peter Goettler, president and chief executive of the libertarian Cato Institute, who suggested in a Washington Post column that the former president's appearance violated the gathering's core values and that "the political party pretending to be libertarian has transitioned to a different identity.
28% : Trump tried to make light of that by referring to the four criminal indictments against him and joking, "If I wasn't a Libertarian before, I sure as hell am a Libertarian now.
25% : Donald Trump was booed repeatedly while addressing the Libertarian Party National Convention on Saturday night, with many in the crowd shouting insults and decrying him for things like his COVID-19 policies, running up towering federal deficits and lying about his political record.
24% : Those for and against Trump even clashed over seating arraignments.
23% : Trump tried to win over the crowd by pledging to include a Libertarian in his Cabinet, but many in the crowd hissed in disbelief.
22% : Polls have shown for months that most voters do not want a 2020 rematch between Trump and President Joe Biden.
8% : That dynamic could potentially boost support for an alternative like the Libertarian nominee or Kennedy, whose candidacy has allies of Biden and Trump concerned that he could be a spoiler.
5% : In his speech at the Libertarian convention, Kennedy accused Trump and Biden of trampling on personal liberties in response to the pandemic.
5% : Trump bowed to pressure from public health officials and shut down businesses, Kennedy said, while Biden was wrong to mandate vaccines for millions of workers.
3% : "Trump tried to praise "fierce champions of freedom in this room" and called President Joe Biden a "tyrant" and the "worst president in the history of the United States," prompting some in the audience to scream back: "That's you."As the insults continued, Trump eventually hit back, saying "you don't want to win" and suggesting that some Libertarians want to "keep getting your 3% every four years.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.