The prime-time speeches at the Convention last night featured two of the more important speeches of the convention – the keynote speech from Chris Christie and Ann Romney’s first major speech of the campaign. The vibe from the floor of the Tampa Bay Times Forum was pretty clear to me – Ann Romney stole the show. Her speech was moving and everyone in the hall was captivated by her.
One of the things that struck Norm Leahy and I yesterday while we were interviewing and recording one of our podcasts was how loud the arena was – it was difficult to find an empty spot to sit down and talk. Not when Ann Romney was on the floor. While there was a low buzz from folks who weren’t in their seats, inside the arena you could have heard a pin drop. Everyone was focused on what she was saying, and what she was saying was great – exactly what Mitt Romney needed from this convention.
When you strip away the policy debates, the talk about the records of the candidates, and the rest of the political trappings of a presidential campaign, many votes turn on likeability. Romney has trailed the President so far in that category, and the Obama campaign has done a good job of framing the choice between Mr. Cool and the out-of-touch, rich, white guy who makes $10,000 bets and has an elevator for his cars. As one person who knows Mitt Romney better than anyone else, Ann Romney needed to transcend that image, humanize Mitt Romney in a way that only a wife could, and help him connect to voters.
She did that, and she did it in a way that had delegates and guests in the forum using words and phrases like “sincere,” “totally believable,” “heartfelt” and “truly heartfelt” to describe their reaction to her words.
This was exactly what she needed to do, and exactly what Mitt Romney’s campaign has done a poor job in conveying for months now. Ann Romney did in one speech what dozens of Romney surrogates haven’t been able to do in months – she made people like Mitt for who he is. And her words and sincerity made his decision to be at the Forum, standing off-stage during her speech and coming out after she was finished to give his wife a hug and a kiss seem natural and non-political. He wasn’t wooden Al Gore coming out to awkwardly kiss his wife because that’s what the script called for. He was a loving husband who was there for his wife as she made her first major speech – a speech she was visibly nervous in giving until she hit her stride. What we saw on the stage last night was real, and that should go a long way in convincing folks who believed that Romney was an aloof rich guy that there is more to the man than offshore bank accounts and dogs on cars.
Chris Christie, on the other hand, gave a more generic speech that seemed to clash with Ann’s. This makes sense – keep in mind that Ann Romney was supposed to headline Monday night and Chris Christie was supposed to headline Tuesday, until Isacc forced an audible on the schedule. But his speech seemed to be more about the Republican party – and introducing Chris Christie to a national audience – than in promoting Mitt Romney. While the crowd liked his speech, it didn’t have the kind of emotional impact Ann Romney’s did. It was a conventional convention speech.
Ann Romney’s didn’t feel that way.
