GOP readies to renominate Trump

Party messaging will be focused on accomplishments

A group of delegates — six representing each state, territory and the District of Columbia for a total of 336 — is expected to begin arriving this weekend for the Republican National

Convention before a formal roll call Monday morning in Charlotte, North Carolina. There, President Donald Trump will be nominated in a ballroom at the Charlotte Convention Center to lead his party for another four years.

The gathering will be muted compared with what was originally envisioned, before the coronavirus pandemic upended both parties’ convention plans.

Charlotte, originally prepared to host a raucous presidential renomination celebration, will now be where the procedural party business will take place. Republican National Committee members will gather over the weekend for their annual summer meeting. And Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and a group of congressional lawmakers are expected to arrive Monday for the televised, inperson roll call and for brief nomination speeches.

Perhaps as an indicator of a line of attack that can be expected, Trump hit his opponent hard Friday.

Trump said that where Biden sees “American darkness,” he sees “American greatness.”

“Over the last week, the Democrats held the darkest and angriest and gloomiest convention in American history,” Trump said in a speech to the GOP-aligned Council for National Policy in Arlington, Virginia. “They spent four straight days attacking America as racist, a horrible country that must be redeemed. ”

Biden, in his nomination acceptance speech Thursday night, portrayed Trump as someone who tries to divide Americans. “United we can and will overcome this season of darkness in America,” Biden said.

Trump and the Democrats agreed on one thing. Just as the Democrats had repeatedly contended Thursday night, Trump declared, “The future of our country and indeed our civilization is at stake on Nov. 3.”

He chided the Democrats, saying their convention did not address the threat from China or bringing safety to Democraticrun cities. “Joe Biden grimly declared a season of American darkness,” Trump said.

Vice President Mike Pence, interviewed Friday, said the Republican National Convention next week will focus on what Trump has accomplished, including the economy and his coronavirus response.

Pence promised a heavy focus on GOP support for law and order and said the Democrats had failed to acknowledge violence plaguing some U.S. cities.

“We’re going to make sure that the American people see the choice here,” Pence said.

Trump and Pence have blamed outbreaks of violence on a radical left, which they have sought to associate with Biden and his running mate, Sen. Kamala Harris of California.

The Democrats held four nights of virtual programming this week for the Democratic National Convention. Next week, the Republicans will take over the Mellon Auditorium in Washington as the hub for their broadcasts, and the main speeches will take place at the White House and at Fort McHenry in Maryland.

But Charlotte, selected more than two years ago as the site for the Republican National Convention, has the distinction this year of being the only in-person portion of either party’s quadrennial gathering.

In June, Trump abruptly moved the convention to Jacksonville, Florida, after reaching a stalemate with Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina, a Democrat, over social distancing rules. The president had no interest in speaking in front of a lessthan-packed arena because delegates were forced to stand 6 feet away from one another.

But Trump was eventually forced to scrap the Jacksonville plans in favor of four nights of virtual prime-time programming that will feature party leaders speaking from a variety of federal properties.

The result, at least optically, will be exactly the scene Trump had hoped to avoid: a cavernous room that, because of social distancing requirements, will look mostly empty — if people follow the rules.

But Trump is still expected to attend Monday, to thank delegates and to deliver a brief nomination speech.

Leading up to kickoff weekend, Republican National Convention attendees were asked to stay at home as much as possible beginning Aug. 6, before their travel, to reduce potential exposure to the coronavirus. While in Charlotte, attendees are expected to have their temperatures taken before entering the venue and then given a daily “healthpass bracelet” that will allow them to participate, according to a copy of the Republicans’ health plan obtained by The New York Times.

All attendees are expected to maintain at least a 6-foot distance from one another while inside the venue, and the Republican National Committee said it would enforce a statewide mask mandate and provide masks, gloves, portable hand sanitizer and sanitizing wipes to all attendees.

But the Republican National Committee was still hoping to provide some kind of enjoyable social experience for attendees. Delegates and members will have the option to go to a jazz club and have dinner out, according to a person involved in the planning, who said that despite all of the health precautions, they still wanted to “normalize” the experience.