Jim Acosta Dunks on Trump’s ‘Very Repetitive and Not Very Funny’ Speech as ‘Groundhog Day Without the Comedy’

CNN’s Jim Acosta had an unflattering review of former President Donald Trump’s speech at the North Carolina Republican Convention Saturday night.

“It is Groundhog Day without the comedy — in other words, very repetitive and not very funny,” said Acosta. “Former President Donald Trump’s first official speech in months saw him repeating the same old tired lies about a stolen election that wasn’t.”

Acosta then played a clip from Trump’s speech the night before. “That election will go down as the crime of the century,” Trump said, “and our country is being destroyed by people who perhaps have no right to destroy it. I am not the one trying to undermine American democracy. I’m the one that’s trying to save it. Please remember that.”

“For 85 minutes it went on like that — low energy to say the least — an airing of grievances about Biden, the economy, China, immigration,” Acosta remarked. “I know it is tempting to laugh this off, if it wasn’t also dangerous coming five months after a Capitol insurrection inspired by lies. Republicans still caught in the grips of a man who incited a mob, and perhaps in a telling twist, one of the songs played before he came to the stage was the theme song to Titanic.”

“But Trump these days is more iceberg than king of the world,” Acosta added. “The jokes didn’t land, the one liners didn’t land, the pants didn’t even seem to fit, as Trump dwelled on 2020 in a speech that was supposed to be about helping Republicans in the midterms.”

Acosta asked commentator Margaret Hoover if she thought these rallies — the NCGOP event was Trump’s first stop of a summer tour — would really help the Republican Party.

“This is a president who has an increasing hold on the party, the Republican party,” replied Hoover, “and decreasing influence on the country’s politics…in terms of his own influence, generally. Will it help the Republican party? They think so. Does it keep his hold on the Republican Party? One thousand percent.”

“Is this going to help in 2022?” Hoover continued. “I don’t see anybody running to the Republican banner in 2022 with him at the top, with him promoting the Republican brand and promoting the Republican Party, that didn’t show up in 2020. So it’s a no, but it doesn’t change the way Republicans see him, and they continue to believe that he’s the future of the party.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.