MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin — Tensions are high in the Badger State’s biggest city as the 2024 Republican National Convention (RNC) commences on Monday after a would-be assassin tried but failed to kill former President Donald Trump on Saturday night in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Trump is set to win the Republican nomination for president for the third straight election as delegates on Monday will formally nominate him again in 2024 after his historic rise in 2016 and his reelection bid in 2020 where he was narrowly defeated in the highly controversial general election by Democrat President Joe Biden. Trump has yet to name a running mate but is expected to as soon as Monday morning — finalists are reportedly Sens. J.D. Vance (R-OH), Marco Rubio (R-FL), and Tim Scott (R-SC), as well as North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum.
The political conversation over the past several weeks since the late-June debate has been dominated by divisions among Democrats — usually Democrats are unified, but Biden’s disastrous performance in the debate threw into sharp contrast the Democrats’ abysmal polling numbers and perilous situation they find themselves in just a few months from the all-important Nov. 5 election. But everything changed again on Saturday night when a 20-year-old man named Thomas Matthew Crooks climbed on a rooftop with line-of-sight at Trump on his rally stage in Butler and opened fire on the former president.
Crooks hit Trump with one of the several rounds he fired, and the former president has described the bullet ripping through the flesh of his ear. U.S. Secret Service snipers killed Crooks seconds later, and as agents rushed the stage to protect Trump and escort him to safety, he held up a fist in defiance as blood streamed down his face from the bullet wound and yelled to the crowd, “fight, fight, fight.” Trump was luckier than some other rally-goers, as a brave firefighter whose last act was shielding his daughter from the gunfire was killed and two others are reportedly in critical condition while others also reportedly suffered injuries.
It has been decades since Americans have seen a major party presidential candidate face a serious assassination attempt. The last president who was shot while in office was President Ronald Reagan. Reagan survived the gunshots and went on to win 49 states in the 1984 presidential election. Trump, a former president who is again seeking the office, was already riding very high in polls before this incident, and while no new polling has been conducted yet since it happened, betting markets have swung dramatically in Trump’s and Republicans’ favor throughout the day on Sunday.
While some party insiders wondered if the Republican Convention would even happen, or if it would be delayed given the circumstances, Trump and his inner circle insisted the convention must go on. Biden and Trump spoke by phone on Saturday evening, the current president announced in an Oval Office address to the nation in primetime on Sunday evening. Biden also said he has directed federal law enforcement and national security agencies to increase security so Republicans can have their convention in peace and safety.
This historic moment in American politics comes as the balance of power in Washington is up-for-grabs. In addition to obviously currently holding the White House, Democrats currently control a slim majority in the U.S. Senate. Republicans, meanwhile, currently hold a slim majority in the U.S. House. The White House and both chambers of Congress are on the line in November. Conventional wisdom before the debate and before the failed assassination attempt against Trump held that, given the map, Republicans would likely take the U.S. Senate back, but Democrats would likely take the House back because of Republicans’ serious issues under current Speaker Mike Johnson. The severe and tumultuous change in circumstances in the political climate — Biden’s abysmal debate combined with weeks of Democrat infighting over that with dozens of Democrats pushing to try to switch Biden out with another presidential candidate and now the failed assassination attempt on Trump — however, seems to suggest Republicans could be headed to a 1984-level election win if things continue on the current trajectory.
That has Democrats panicking after years of demagoguery against Trump falsely claiming he is a “dictator” or “authoritarian” or “threat to democracy,” worried that their worst fears may come true: Republicans may not only just take the White House back in a defining landslide election that gives Trump a real mandate to govern, but the GOP might actually win stronger-than-expected majorities in both chambers of Congress, which would help Trump implement his agenda.
The wild ride that is the 2024 election will hit another gear this week as Republicans aim to portray Biden’s and Democrats’ governance as a deep and clear failure. Many of the main stage primetime programming speeches from Republicans will come from ordinary Americans, people not in elected office but simply affected negatively by the policies the Democrats have pursued. The city of Milwaukee, which has dozens of square city blocks cordoned off as an outer vehicle perimeter erected this weekend will limit traffic into and out of the area around a more secure inner perimeter secured by the Secret Service, is seeing thousands of Republicans from all 50 states and top stars on the American right enter the city, which is also now crawling with reporters and media figures.
Biden, meanwhile, will travel the nation as he seeks to counter-program Republicans — something he discussed in his rare Oval Office address on Sunday evening. One thing missing from Biden’s address, though, was while he called for unity and calm, he did not address his administration’s or other Democrats’ weaponization of government and the legal system to target Trump in particular, but also more broadly Trump supporters. Trump has spent the last several years fighting off a politicized Department of Justice and similarly sham prosecutions from local Democrat officials, including a case in New York for which he was convicted earlier this year. Trump’s conviction, legal experts across the political spectrum agree, is almost certainly going to be completely overturned on appeal, so the effort appears to be have been just a sinister waste of taxpayer resources all so Democrats could get the headline that they can call Trump a “convicted felon.” Even with that, and millions upon millions of dollars spent promoting that nonsense in paid and earned media, Democrats have not moved the numbers their way. In fact, internal Democrat polling from Biden’s own super PAC leaked after the debate showed that post-debate Trump was surging even in several blue states, but even before the debate, Trump had taken a convincing lead and was on his way to a landslide victory anyway.
How the greatest and most powerful nation on planet earth works its way through these escalating political tensions is going to be a story to behold for generations to come. Trump is currently on a glide path to victory and so are Republicans writ large, but Democrats are always looking for ways to fight back into things. Some Democrats have anonymously already said they are giving up on this election, and while Republicans have lots to be hopeful for this year, one other theme of this year’s convention will be how Republicans aim to see this thing through to the end.
