Donald Trump speech exclusive: 'We have nothing to fear but fear itself'

Donald J Trump’s speech to the Republican national convention in Cleveland accepting the party’s presidential nomination

To all my fellow citizens of this great nation, with profound gratitude and great humility, I accept the nomination for the presidency of the United States. We meet at one of those defining moments – a moment when our nation is at war, our economy is in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more. These challenges are not all of government’s making, but the failure to respond is a direct result of a broken politics in Washington. America, we are better than these last eight years. We are a better country than this.

My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country. In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility. I welcome it. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavour will light our country and all who serve it. And the glow from that fire can truly light the world.

If we lose freedom here, there’s no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man’s relation to man.

We have come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself – nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyses needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and of suffering. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: victory; victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror; victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.

I take up my task with buoyancy and hope. Tonight, I say to the American people across this great land – enough! This moment, this election, is our chance to keep, in the 21st century, the American promise alive.

[Wild cheers, eating of Stetsons by the delegation from Texas, firing of semi-automatics into the air by members of the National Rifle Association, scratching of heads by a few old political hands who feel they’ve heard one or two of these resonant phrases before*]

* Mr Trump’s speechwriters have made liberal – if that is the word – use of Barack Obama’s 2008 acceptance at the Democratic national convention, John F Kennedy’s 1961 inauguration speech, Ronald Reagan’s 1964 A Time for Choosing speech, Martin Luther King’s 1963 I Have a Dream speech, Franklin D Roosevelt’s 1933 inauguration speech, Winston Churchill’s first speech to the House of Commons as prime minister in 1940, and Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 Gettysburg Address.