GOP Likely to Move Part of Convention to Jacksonville

(Bloomberg) -- The Republican National Committee is planning a two-part convention in two separate locations in August with the marquee events likely moving to Jacksonville, Florida, after the party failed to reach agreement with its initial host over the scope of coronavirus safety precautions, people familiar with the talks said.

Details of the arrangement were still being worked out, but the people said the celebratory part of the gathering, including President Donald Trump’s acceptance speech, would be the week of August 24, which is when the convention was originally scheduled in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Florida is key to Trump’s re-election effort and Republicans familiar with the convention planning said that while Jacksonville doesn’t have the hotel space and convention infrastructure of other cities, it has a Republican mayor. Party officials are still ironing out details, including whether the city has hotel capacity for the tens of thousands of delegates, media, officials and hangers-on who would come for the event.

The Washington Post first reported Jacksonville was the likely site.

A smaller group of officials would still meet in Charlotte the week before, and formally nominate Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, but the two candidates wouldn’t attend. The delegates would adopt the party’s policy platform in Jacksonville, the people said.

Over the last week, Florida has seen rising numbers of new Covid-19 cases, with about 1,000 new people a day testing positive.

White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said on Fox News Wednesday “no decision had been made” on a new location.

“There have been a number of cities under consideration. The president loves the state of North Carolina, really wanted to have it there, but unfortunately you have a governor there who is not willing to say, yes, you can move forward,” she said. “It’s a grave injustice to his state, taking a lot of economic boom out of there, that comes with a convention.”

The decision to move part of the convention came after North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper said his state couldn’t agree to demands for a “full convention which includes 19,000 delegates,” as well as “full hotels and bars at capacity” due to social distancing requirements.

Trump tweeted that the GOP was “forced to seek” a new city for the party’s convention. A week earlier the president had threatened to move the convention to a different city if Cooper wouldn’t allow all expected participants to come. Locations that were being considered included Nashville, Las Vegas, Orlando, Phoenix and Savannah, Georgia.

Dean Black, chairman of the Duval County Republicans in Jacksonville, also said the city had worked hard to get the group to move there.

“The mayor’s office has obviously been very involved in all of this and that’s really one of our greatest strengths: We have a unified Republican government here,” Black said. “They are accustomed to planning large events on the fly.”

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