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By Giulia Carbonaro
Senior Reporter
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Hundreds of empty chairs were reportedly removed before Donald Trump's speech at a convention of religious broadcasters in Nashville, Tennessee.
Trump, the Republican presidential frontrunner, spoke at the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB) International Christian Media Convention on Thursday. According to Vivian Jones, a reporter for The Tennessean, the former president didn't show up until two hours and 40 minutes after the NRB presidential forum began.
"More than two hours into the presidential forum, Donald Trump is not yet on stage," she wrote. "The room is far from full. About 20 mins ago, staff cleared out about 300 chairs from the far back corner. Photo on the left was taken just after 7pm, photo on the right was taken just now," she wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
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The images she shared on the social media platform show the same room at the Gaylord Opryland Resort and Convention Center in Nashville with a significantly different number of chairs towards the back of the room. While the first picture shows rows of empty seats, the second photo shows that a majority of the seats are occupied.
Noelle Huizenga, NRB spokesperson, told Newsweek, "This was not an NRB operational matter. NRB was not tracking any movement of chairs and I can't confirm whether the information in that tweet is correct. "
"After nearly an hour of singing by the Signature Sound quartet, the crowd here is 'milling about smartly' awaiting Trump's arrival. No one is on stage. There is Christian music on the loudspeaker," Jones wrote in another post. She later wrote that Trump arrived on stage "two hours and 40 minutes after the NRB presidential forum began."
In an article published in the newspaper after the event, Jones wrote that Trump spoke to a crowd of 1,500, who she describes as "enthusiastic."
Newsweek contacted Vivian Jones and the NRB for comment by email early on Friday morning.
The former president called on Christians to support his third presidential bid, portraying the 2024 election in religious terms as a Christian battle. If elected, he told the audience at the forum, he'd "protect God in the public square," he said, defending Christian broadcasters' "pro-God" content from censorship, as reported by The Tennessean.
"I really believe it's the biggest thing missing from this country, the biggest thing. We have to bring back our religion. We have to bring back Christianity," Trump said. The former president, who's been married three times and has a scheduled trial over allegedly paying hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels, described himself as "a very proud Christian, actually."
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in the Stormy Daniels trial, which is due to begin on March 25.
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Voters in Tennessee will cast their ballot in the Republican presidential primary on March 5, while early voting is already open. Before the Volunteer State, Trump is expected to face former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley in her home state on February 24. Trump is the frontrunner in polling for both states.
As of February 22, Trump had an estimated 63.6 percent of the vote in South Carolina, according to FiveThirtyEight, against Haley's 33.1 percent. As of the same date, Trump had 84.8 percent of the vote in Tennessee against Haley's 16.1 percent.
Update 2/23/24, 4:32 a.m. ET: This article was updated with additional context.
Update 2/23/24 12:35 p.m. ET: This article was updated with comment from Noelle Huizenga.
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