A brief explainer on Fort McHenry, site of Pence’s RNC speech
Mike Pence will be speaking Wednesday from Fort McHenry in Baltimore, where he will deliver his keynote speech at the Republican National Convention.
The fort, a national historical site, was key in the War of 1812, specifically the battle of Baltimore, where it defended Baltimore Harbor from British attack. A flag that flew above the fort served as inspiration for “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Earlier this week, a brick walkway at the historic site was damaged by crews setting up for Pence’s speech.
Intelligence officials haven’t seen anything to back up claims of foreign meddling in mail-in voting
Despite concerns expressed by President Trump and Attorney General Barr about voting by mail, including the possibility of printing counterfeit ballots, an intelligence official said Wednesday that no such effort has been detected.
“We have no information or intelligence that any nation state threat actor is engaging in any kind of activity to undermine any part of the mail-in vote or ballot,” the official said.
A U.S. intelligence official said the only successful attacks seen so far have broadly targeted government computer networks, and “none have inhibited the ability for people to vote or the integrity of the process.”
And in a major change from four years ago, the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI now tell both local and state officials about any attempted hostile intrusions. In the past, such attempts sometimes went unreported because of concerns about sharing intelligence information.
States independently conduct their elections, and that lack of centralization turns out to be an asset.
“It’s very difficult for an adversary to meddle with the actual vote count,” an FBI official said.
As for concerns about domestic mail voter fraud, an FBI official said it would be “extraordinarily difficult to change a federal election outcome through this type of fraud alone, given the range of processes that would need to be compromised at the local level.”
Legendary college football coach Lou Holtz to praise Trump at RNC
Legendary college football coach Lou Holtz, 83, will speak in praise of Donald Trump at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday.
“When a leader tells you something, you’ve got to be able to count on it. That’s President Trump,” he will say. “He says what he means, he means what he says, and he’s done what he said he would do at every single turn.”
Holtz, who endorsed Trump in 2016, apologized in 2008 for saying on ESPN that “Hitler was a great leader, too” when talking about another coach struggling initially at a new job.
Holtz also made headlines earlier this month when he compared playing college football this fall to World War II in an interview with Fox News, saying it’s necessary regardless of the risk.
“People stormed Normandy,” Holtz said. “They knew there was going to be casualties, they knew there was gonna be risk. … It’s our way of living, look at it from both points of view. The risk is always there. But you cannot just look at it from one side.”
RNC to dig in on law and order as Jacob Blake shooting fuels fresh protests
Driving President Trump’s “law and order” message, the third night of the Republican convention Wednesday is expected to emphasize police and the military against the backdrop of protests sparked by a police officer shooting a Black man in Wisconsin.
“The violence we are seeing in these and other cities isn’t happening by chance; it’s the direct result of elected leaders refusing to allow law enforcement to protect our communities,” Michael McHale, a veteran of the Sarasota police department, is expected to say, according to excerpts shared by the Trump campaign.
Sam Vigil, whose wife was shot and killed in her car in their garage, will thank the president for “Operation Legend,” the federal law enforcement program Trump initiated in the wake of the George Floyd protests, according to the campaign.
“The police were overwhelmed. They needed help. Help arrived when President Trump launched Operation Legend in July of this year,” Vigil is expected to say.
The end of the third night of programming will feature Vice President Mike Pence accepting his party’s nomination to again serve as Trump’s running mate.
As Richard Grenell addresses RNC, GOP platform still opposes gay marriage
Former U.S. ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell is scheduled to speak to the Republican National Convention on Wednesday night, becoming only the third openly gay man to address the Grand Old Party’s quadrennial event.
Grenell, who served as acting director of national intelligence for several months earlier this year and thus became the first openly gay Cabinet official, recently appeared in a video produced by the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay conservative group, in which he called Trump “the most pro-gay president” in history.
But while Trump is the first Republican president to verbalize his support for same-sex marriage (before he was elected in 2016, he told Bill O’Reilly he opposed it), the party he helms still officially opposes gay unions — five years after they became legal across the United States.
Harris says Pence speech will be ‘nothing but lies’
In a campaign text to supporters, Kamala Harris said that Mike Pence’s keynote speech Wednesday before the Republican National Convention will contain “nothing but lies.”
“Mike Pence is speaking tonight at the RNC, but I’m not worried about what he’s going to say — I know it will be nothing but lies,” she said.
The Biden campaign has blasted the president’s renomination convention on similar grounds. On Tuesday, the campaign said the first night of the RNC contained “too many lies to count” and amounted to “total malarkey.”
Pence is set to speak from Fort McHenry in Baltimore later Wednesday. He is expected to fill his address with patriotic themes while hitting on the culture war controversy over standing during the national anthem, as an administration official told NBC News.
Trump calls for drug test before debate with Biden. He used the same baseless attack on Clinton.
President Trump called for Joe Biden to take a drug test before their highly-anticipated fall debate, a familiar half-baked attack he used against Hillary Clinton in 2016 during their debates.
“Nobody thought that he was even going to win,” Trump told The Washington Examiner in an interview published Wednesday. “Because his debate performances were so bad. Frankly, his best performance was against Bernie. We’re going to call for a drug test, by the way, because his best performance was against Bernie. It wasn’t that he was Winston Churchill, because he wasn’t, but it was a normal, boring debate. You know, nothing amazing happened. And we are going to call for a drug test, because there’s no way — you can’t do that.”
Biden participated in 11 Democratic primary debates in a crowded field of candidates. He earned praise for his debate performance in South Carolina before his decisive victory in the primary, but also received some criticism for rambling answers in others.
Trump used the same baseless attack against Clinton in 2016. He claimed that drugs actually depleted her energy during the debates, saying “she was all pumped up at the beginning, and at the end it was like, ‘Oh, take me down.’ She could barely reach her car.”
Two House Democrats ask for probe into possible Hatch Act violations
Two congressional Democrats are asking the U.S. Office of Special Council to investigate whether acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and “other senior members of the Trump administration” violated the Hatch Act during the Republican National Convention on Tuesday evening, according to a letter provided to NBC.
The Hatch Act of 1939 prohibits federal employees from engaging in most political activity inside federal buildings or while working for the federal government.
“They coordinated a citizenship ceremony and a pardon as elements in the convention’s nationally-televised programming,” wrote Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois and Don Beyer of Virginia. “These officials mixed official government business with political activities as part of one of the largest political campaign events of the year,” the two wrote. Krishnamoorthi sits on the House Oversight Committee.
What to expect from Pence’s speech at Fort McHenry tonight
Trump sends federal law enforcement and National Guard to Kenosha
President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he is sending federal law enforcement and the National Guard to Kenosha, Wisconsin, to “restore law and order” amid protests over the police shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man.
“We will NOT stand for looting, arson, violence, and lawlessness on American streets,” Trump said in a series of tweets. “My team just got off the phone with Governor Evers who agreed to accept federal assistance.”
The announcement comes after Tuesday night’s protests in Kenosha where two people were killed and one was injured. An investigation is underway and the victims’ identities have not yet been released, the city police department said. A 17-year-old has been taken into custody and faces charges of intentional homicide, authorities said.
Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers announced on Wednesday that he was sending 500 National Guard members to Kenosha tonight.
Trump added that Portland, Oregon, should follow in Kenosha’s footsteps and accept federal assistance after a riot at city hall where 23 protestors were arrested.
Meanwhile, Trump’s opponent Joe Biden and his running mate, Sen. Kamala Harris, said Wednesday they had spoken with Blake’s family to offer their support. In a video posted to his Twitter account, Biden said he told them that “justice must and will be done.”
“What I saw that video makes me sick,” Biden says. He also condemned violence and looting in Kenosha, saying that, “protesting brutality is a right and absolutely necessary. But burning down communities is not protest. It’s needless violence.”
Harris, appearing at a virtual event with Michigan community leaders a short while later, saying that she, too, spoke with Blake’s family and offered her thoughts on the shooting.
“What happened there is so tragic and still represents the two systems of justice in America. There are still two systems of justice in America,” she said. “We need to fight again for that ideal that all people are supposed to be treated equally, which is still not happening.”
