Peter Thiel’s RNC speech draws rave reviews from crowd

Tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel ignited a thunderous applause on Thursday night when he became the first openly gay man to address the Republican National Convention and tout his sexuality onstage.

 

“I am proud to be gay,” Thiel declared. “I am proud to be Republican. But most of all, I am proud to be an American.”

 

The line prompted the crowd at the GOP convention in Cleveland to roar with applause and chant, “USA, USA, USA!”

 

Watch Peter Thiel Tell The RNC Audience That He’s Proud To Be Gay And Republican
“Stand up and vote for Donald Trump.”

Thiel, a Silicon Valley investor who cofounded PayPal and was the first major private investor in Facebook, was an early supporter of Republican nominee Donald Trump.

 

The billionaire said that he didn’t “pretend to agree with every plank in our party’s platform.”

 

“But fake culture wars only distract us from our economic decline,” he contended. “And nobody in this race is being honest about it except Donald Trump.”

 

Peter Thiel, cofounder of PayPal, delivers a speech during the Republican National Convention.

 

In his speech, Thiel argued that the US had become distracted with identity politics.

 

“When I was a kid, the great debate was about how to defeat the Soviet Union. And we won,” he said. “Now we are told that the great debate is about who gets to use which bathroom.”

 

Thiel also said that Americans should not accept incompetence from their government and invoked technology to illustrate his point.

 

“Our nuclear bases still use floppy disks. Our newest fighter jets can’t even fly in the rain. And it would be kind to say the government’s software works poorly, because much of the time it doesn’t even work at all,” he said.

 

Read More: Peter Thiel’s RNC speech draws rave reviews from crowd – Business Insider