Micahael Cummins
Anthony Sweeney, a Cleveland chef, says his city has been unusually quiet because of the GOP convention.
In a sense, every Cleveland resident is attending the Republican National Convention— their lives here have been majorly disrupted.
Getting around downtown is nearly impossible by car and is a challenge even on foot, due to the maze-like cordoning off of various sensitive areas. It’s not unusual to have to walk three or four blocks to get across the street.
I met local chef Anthony Sweeney on the train ride into town Tuesday. We talked about how, despite strong expectations of protest-related mayhem, downtown Cleveland was very calm the previous day and night. “That’s unusual for Cleveland,” Sweeney added. “There’s always some type of disruption downtown.”
The chronic chaos notwithstanding, Anthony loves Cleveland. “It’s a beautiful city. We just got idiots here.”
The prevailing calm is being helped along by an overwhelming police presence. It seems like every police officer in America is here. They clog the sidewalks, radiating friendliness toward pedestrians struggling to find a path around them. I keep expecting to hear reports that mass looting has broken out in other cities, their police forces having absconded to Cleveland en masse.
After (finally) sorting out my credentials situation, I wandered around downtown to soak up the pageantry. Whatever threat free political expression might be under in America generally, it is flourishing in Cleveland this week. The Revolutionary Communist Party held what appeared to be an impromptu march, dozens strong, straight down crowded “media row” on East Fourth Street. Everyone just kind of made way for them, and politely accepted the flyers they were handing out titled “Time To Get Organized for an ACTUAL REVOLUTION.”
Dr. Cornel West appeared in the street, seemingly out of nowhere. The philosopher/scholar/activist is in town to lead a late Tuesday afternoon rally to “Protest Murder by Police.” I asked West if he worries that his refusal to support Hillary Clinton will help Donald Trump become president. He said no, but then added, “I’m unconvinced by her case.”
Michael Cummins
Scott Grabins, chair of the Republican Party of Dane County, says of the convention's flashiness that “production values are important.”
The convention proceedings were not scheduled to start until early evening, so I went to the Downtown Hilton to visit with a couple of Madison-area delegates. Scott Grabins of Verona is chair of the Republican Party of Dane County, and a friend. I asked him if he was put off by the over-the-top theatricality of Donald Trump’s convention entrance Monday night. It strikes me as hypocritical that Republicans are okay with Trump’s penchant for flashiness despite having excoriated Barack Obama’s “celebrity campaign” back in 2008.
Grabins pointed out that “production values are important” these days. “I just thought that, at worst, it took away a little from his final appearance,” he said, referring to Trump’s upcoming acceptance speech on Thursday.
I also asked about the procedural dust-up that had occurred on the floor Monday afternoon, when the anti-Trump faction’s demand for a roll call vote on the Republican National Committee rules was ignored by the temporary chair of the convention. Grabins is not part of the faction, but said, “I was not opposed to the roll call vote. We’re here to work out issues. Everyone should have a voice, so that when the convention ends we can be unified. Let people get it off their chests.”
I strongly agree with Scott. The anti-Trump faction is, by now, a decided minority among the delegates. A roll call vote, and the attendant debate, would have undoubtedly ended with adoption of the rules that the Trump campaign and the RNC leadership wanted. Why not endure an hour of discomfort to placate the dissenters? The powers that be are deathly concerned about appearances, but no one watching Monday’s proceedings was fooled into believing that all the delegates were content.
Michael Cummins
Roger Stauter, an RNC delegate from Monona, says the Trump campaign has done nothing to court Republicans who have opposed his rise.
Delegate Roger Stauter of Monona thinks he knows why the anti-Trump forces had to be “steamrolled.”
“This is typical of Trump and [campaign manager Paul] Manafort. Manafort likes to say things like ‘we crushed them.’ They make no effort to bring opposition into the fold,” he said. “Twenty percent of the delegates are trying to convince themselves to support Trump, but they are getting no help from his campaign.”
Stauter is, as you might have guessed, an adamant anti-Trumper.
I made it to the convention floor shortly before the evening session was gaveled in. The first person I sought out was Beau Correll, a Virginia delegate who was pledged to vote for Donald Trump in the imminent nomination proceedings. Earlier this summer, Correll brought a federal lawsuit to “unbind” himself.
The judge in that case ruled that the Virginia state law that bound Correll is unconstitutional under the First Amendment. But at last week’s RNC Rules Committee meeting, a party rule was put in place affirming each delegate’s bound status. Legally speaking, the Republican Party is a private organization, and so not subject to the First Amendment constraints. The binding rule was part of the package confirmed by the full body Monday.
So where did this leave Correll? I asked him what he would do when it came time to vote. “We’ll see how this plays out,” he said rather mysteriously.
When Virginia’s results were announced, they were completely consistent with the pledged counts.
The “Dump Trump” movement finally succumbed, dying with a fizzle.