Donald Trump officially accepts GOP presidential nomination

But the four-day long conclave also included plenty of drama, chaos and displays of party disunity.

The billionaire proceeded to lay out a dark vision of America: “Our convention occurs at a moment of crisis for our nation”.

Trump cited several statistics to show a violent America in economic turmoil.

Just moments after he said he didn’t care about getting an endorsement from Cruz, Trump mused that he might start a super PAC to attack Cruz if the senator made a decision to launch a presidential campaign in four years. “The GOP convention has shown us that failure is simply not an option”.

Trump named people who have been killed by undocumented immigrants, including some whose family members spoke earlier in the convention, and issued a warning about the “180,000 illegal immigrants with criminal records…tonight roaming free to threaten peaceful citizens”. Shortly after, the same sequence occurred.

Senior Clinton aide John Podesta attacked Mr Trump for offering little more than “prejudice and paranoia” and promised she would set out a more positive vision for America when she accepts the party’s nomination at its convention next week in Philadelphia.

“Trump: ‘I alone can fix this.’ Is this guy running for president or dictator?'” he tweeted.

Trump’s acceptance speech as the party nominee was interrupted repeatedly by cheers and chants, whoops and hollers, by the enthusiastic crowd of delegates packed into the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio.

But Trump’s nomination speech, like every Trump speech, was completely devoid of solutions to the many, many problems Trump said was wrong with America.

Plagiarism quiz: Who were the caught-out copycats?

In a bout of poor organising, senator Joni Ernst, a young up-and-comer in the party from swing-state Iowa, was haphazardly pushed off prime time into a speaking slot late on Monday night. “He didn’t quite finish it off at least to the satisfaction of most of the people in the arena”. It exacerbated feelings of party disunity at a convention chock-full of it.

“Ted Cruz stood on the same stage and made essentially the same comments I did a year ago and I guess he has to reconcile, did he have his fingers crossed or not”, Walker said on WTMJ’s Charlie Sykes Show on Thursday. It was a high-stakes strategic gamble: Cruz is betting Trump will lose, and that he’ll emerge prophetic and untainted by being among the few Republicans who refused to associate himself with it. “You’ve got to go for Trump”.

As he moves into the general election campaign, he is sticking to his most controversial proposals, including building a wall along the entire US-Mexico border and suspending immigration from nations “compromised by terrorism”. Trump’s statement Thursday night made some even more optimistic.

Presidential nominee Donald Trump will aim to unify a fractious party in his final remarks as the Republican National Convention draws to a close. Clinton’s campaign is working hard to keep her VP choice a secret – she doesn’t want a leak.

Mr Trump launched a fierce attack on Hillary Clinton, describing her as a puppet being propped up by “big business, elite media and major donors”. The Republican angst was a natural outgrowth of prominent party figures spending the past year raising expectations that she’d go to prison.

“We’re the only ones left”, she wrote. I hate to bring up the f-word, but what a fascist thing to say, future “Dear Leader”.

It was a combination of rhetoric, political promise and swagger that was well received by many.

He claimed to be the “voice” of the people who had been “ignored, neglected and abandoned” and renewed his promise to “build a great border wall” along the United States border with Mexico to stop illegal immigration and drug trafficking. He paused as they grow louder. “People can walk out, they can turn around”, Stokes said.

The crowd bathed him in applause and cheers of “USA!”