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The dramatically scaled-down Republican National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, will be closed to the press, a convention spokesperson and Republican official familiar with the plans tell CNN. Reporters will not be allowed on site as RNC delegates vote to formally nominate President Donald Trump as the 2020 Republican presidential nominee, but the vote will be livestreamed, the Republican official said. The restriction is unprecedented in modern American political history, but Republican officials said they were forced to limit attendance due to social distancing restrictions imposed by the governor of North Carolina. "Given the health restrictions and limitations in place...

A Democratic Party meeting that leaders hoped would project unity weeks ahead of the national convention instead broke out into a behind-the-scenes feud over corporate money in politics. At a virtual gathering of a key committee for the Democratic National Convention, Bernie Sanders-allied members said Joe Biden appointees called them “children” and made other rude comments in a breakout room where they were talking privately. The argument served as a reminder of the tensions that are still simmering below the surface between moderate and progressives as the party seeks a united front against President Donald Trump. It also shows the...

Wisconsin police departments are withdrawing from agreements to send personnel to the Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee next month. Police departments in Fond du Lac, Franklin and West Allis have backed out, some citing Milwaukee's new orders against the police use of tear gas and pepper spray. The departure of those departments casts doubts on the program designed to bring about 1,000 officers from outside agencies to provide security at the convention. The convention, which will be held at the Wisconsin Center in downtown Milwaukee, has been scaled down to a mostly virtual event, with only about 300 people expected...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday he is uncertain he will attend the Republican National Convention in August, as a number of Republican senators have said they will likely not go.

A smart choice, if the reports from NBC News and the Washington Post are accurate. Donald Trump has champed at the bit to return to the campaign trail, hoping to reinvigorate his political base and stoke enthusiasm ahead of the November election. That impatience ended up backfiring in Tulsa, where the indoor venue and a clear reluctance of even his fervent backers to risk exposure to COVID-19 led to much smaller crowds than expected.Rather than risk more poor optics, Team Trump has shifted its thinking on venues, NBC reports. Instead of indoor arenas where the risk is highest, they...

HOUSTON, Texas -- Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner announced on Wednesday that the city has canceled its contract with the GOP convention, which was scheduled at the George R. Brown Convention Center on July 16. "Look, these are some very serious times, and the safety of the people attending the convention, the employees, their family members, the people in the city of Houston, have their public health concerns," Turner said. "First responders, police, fire, and municipal workers will all be in contact or in close proximity to this indoor gathering. Simply, the public health concerns outweighed anything else."

he senators skipping out include Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Mitt Romney of Utah, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. The lawmakers gave varying reasons for why they won't be at President Donald Trump's renominating convention. Some of those senators are not among Trump's favorites.

The cable news networks are planning to work together to pool their coverage of the Democratic and Republican national conventions to reduce the number of employees present amid the coronavirus pandemic, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday. Leaders from CNN, MSNBC and Fox News are coordinating on regular calls to figure out "pool" coverage where networks use one video feed to limit the number of workers present, Rashida Jones, senior vice president of MSNBC and NBC News, told the newspaper. Pool coverage has traditionally been used during election coverage, but Jones said coordination between the networks has increased because of...

A scaled-back convention for a scaled back campaign? Seems like a good fit, actually, especially with a nominee that tends to wander rhetorically these days. While Republicans try to build up their convention platform into something ever-more spectacular, Democrats now foresee a “scaled-back” national convention in Milwaukee, Fox News reports from sources in the DNC and on Team Biden as well.One has to wonder, however, just why they’re making this decision. Is this an attempt to contrast their approach to coronavirus concerns against Donald Trump’s, which Democrats and the media are criticizing lately as reckless? Or just a way...

About 20 local community leaders and lawmakers stood in the hot sun in front of the site of the Republican National Convention’s final events and pleaded with the mayor to stop them in light of recent protests, the coronavirus and other issues. **SNIP** Many on Friday were also concerned with the impact protests that normally come with presidential nominating conventions will have on communities near the arena. Activist Hope McMath said the city is “struggling” to handle the protests that are happening on a daily basis. “To think that we will be ready in less than three months to handle...

Jacksonville's mayor scored a major political coup this week: President Trump will deliver his Aug. 27 convention speech in the Florida city after a dispute over coronavirus-related crowd restrictions led him to mostly abandon North Carolina, where the Republican convention was originally planned. "We plan on having a full arena," Mayor Lenny Curry, a Republican, told FOX Business' Stuart Varney on Friday. Republican officials on Thursday evening announced that they were shifting key events away from Charlotte, N.C., after a public rift with the state's Democratic governor over social distancing guidelines.

MILWAUKEE - Democrats will “descend” on Milwaukee for the national convention in August despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez said Wednesday. But Perez stopped short of predicting how many Democrats would be allowed, or willing, to attend. “We don’t know the answer today because we don’t know what the public health situation on the ground will be,” Perez said on a conference call with reporters. Perez promised to stage a “safe and effective convention where we will highlight Joe Biden and his running mate.” **SNIP** Biden and Democrats are in touch with public health experts...

Seeking a city willing to allow a large-scale event amid the coronavirus pandemic, Republicans have tentatively settled on Jacksonville, Fla., as the new destination for the premier festivities of the Republican National Convention in August, according to three Republican officials briefed on the plans. The details of the arrangement are still in flux and RNC aides are scrambling to determine whether the northern Florida city has enough hotel rooms to accommodate the quadrennial event, which typically kicks off the final stretch of the presidential campaign. Republican officials were in Jacksonville on Monday looking at the city and the surrounding areas....

A United Nations human rights expert is recommending changes in the way protests are handled in the United States, saying the process of issuing permits for demonstrations is “arbitrary” and could easily lead to discrimination against certain groups. Maina Kiai of Kenya, U.N. special rapporteur on freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, offered preliminary findings Wednesday from his visits this month to seven U.S. cities — including the sites of this year’s Democratic and Republican political conventions — to investigate how the U.S. upholds its citizens’ rights of assembly and association. Kiai’s full report to the United Nations will...

Other states "wish" that they had followed Florida's lead in their responses to the coronavirus pandemic, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis suggested Thursday, saying he believes the state can host the Republican National Convention this summer. In an interview on "Fox & Friends," DeSantis detailed his tactics heading into Phase II of his state's COVID-19 reopening plan and assured the state was following White House guidelines including limiting group-size to up to 50 people and implementing temperature checks. "I was at Universal Studios yesterday making this announcement. They're now open at least for the pass holders. They are going to be...

Gotta say, I’d have had more sympathy for Roy Cooper in this situation two weeks ago. That would have been before the same people who scolded Republicans and conservatives who wanted to reopen the public square and demonstrate for those policies suddenly thought squeezing several thousand people into streets for demonstrations for a week on end was no problem at all. Political speech takes precedence over commerce, they have argued — so why does that not apply to a full political convention in August?North Carolina’s Democratic governor apparently thinks some political speech requires more planning than others: Governor Roy...

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - The Republican National Committee unveiled plans on Wednesday to proceed with certain convention activities in Charlotte, even though President Donald Trump will deliver his nomination acceptance speech somewhere else. The move comes in response to growing concerns from Gov. Roy Cooper, D-N.C., that the full capacity convention Trump had requested is “very unlikely” to happen in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Cooper wants the GOP to continue discussing a scaled-back convention, while Republicans are seeking assurances that more than 10 people will be allowed in a ROOM. **SNIP** The RNC and city of Charlotte signed a...

Organizers of the Republican National Convention said Tuesday they will begin visiting potential alternative sites after North Carolina's governor told them the COVID-19 pandemic requires them to prepare for a scaled-back event if they want to hold it in Charlotte. Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, said in a letter to the top convention organizer and the national GOP chairwoman that 'planning for a scaled-down convention with fewer people, social distancing and face coverings is a necessity.' The letter came on the eve of a deadline from the GOP for assurances that Cooper would allow a full-scale event in August. Later,...

President Donald Trump said he is moving the Republican National Convention from Charlotte, hours after N.C. Gov. Roy Cooper said he couldn’t guarantee that the August event would be at full capacity due to the coronavirus. In a tweet Tuesday night, Trump said: “Had long planned to have the Republican National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, a place I love. Now, @NC_Governor Roy Cooper and his representatives refuse to guarantee that we can have use of the Spectrum Arena - Spend millions of dollars, have everybody arrive, and then tell them they will not be able to gain entry. “Governor...

Republican National Committee officials are considering Nashville and other locations as potential sites for the GOP convention amid a standoff with North Carolina over whether it will allow the party to hold it in Charlotte as planned. Party officials are expected to make a trip to Nashville later this week, likely Thursday or Friday, according to a person familiar with the deliberations. Nashville is one of several locations in which Republicans are expressing interest. Others include Las Vegas; Orlando, Fla.; Jacksonville, Fla.; and Georgia. All of the prospective sites have directly expressed interest in hosting the convention, and party officials...