The 2020 Republican National convenon. Good evening, im judy woodruf and welcome to our special pbs newshour live coverage of the repu National Convention. This years political conventions are like none any us can remember. Welong with thousands of others have planned to be in thcharlotte, north carolin week. But because of the pandemic, this gathering will be almost entirely virtual. Speakers w are the thethe republicans am im here in the studio with amy walter and amna that. Warner right around the corner. Both df them sociallytant. We have reporters and analysts across the country. We plan to bring you the same depth of coverage and analysis ering this critical time in an historction year. This week President Trump will years. He case for another four and we will be here to hear all of it. Lets turn first to our newshour reporters am that nawaz as i say is in thstudio just around the corner from me to give us a guide on whato expect and key moments to look out for. Hi judy, like the democrats last week a republica featuring a mix of speakers both Party Leaders and officials but also every day americans addressing the convention. Many more of tonights speakers will be live. But among those on the stage, allies of President Trump and the house of representatives including ssman matt gaetz from florida jim jordan from ohio and Steve Scalise of louisiana. S will delivering remarks, closing the night two South Carolinas, senator tim sct of South Carolina and President Trumps former ambassador to the United Nationski haley. Well also hear from the president s family tonight in a speech from ise of h sons, donald trump, jr. As well as testimony yals frosim ss owner, a former teacher, medical professionals some ofers speaking t the key issues in the trump reelection campaign. Judy, were also told that we will hear from the president him siff tonight and every night this week. Woodruff that is what we are hearing so more than once, unlike the all right,na, thank you. Ntions. And well be coming back to you throughout this night. And now im oined by our newshour White House CorrespondentYamiche Alcindor on the north lawn of the white house. President trump just got bac there after an earlier campaign visit to North Carolina. Yamiche, weve already heard fr the president today. S not even waiting until tonight to mawk an appearance. Thats right,udy. The president delivered a speach at the rnc that was alm lt an hoong. And that is longer than the speech joe biden delivered when he was acceptinghe nomination at the dnc. But that was just President Trump warming up what we hear is that the president will play a big role in this convention. He will be heard from every night, that doesnt mean he will speak every night from what we are told he will appear every night. Tonight we are told he is supposed to be a perking with first respwaders. Just check a Trump Campaign official who tells me former hostages freed under the Trump Administration are ulmately mawking an appearance. Tonights theme will be land of promises. The other thing to note is that the overall theme of the night is going to be, or overall theme of the convention is going to be really talking about americas greatness and taing about the ublicans say they are eager to talk about the optimistic versions of america, talking about the story of america. They say the democrats were if dark tones and they plan to be more uplifting. Woodruff so yamiche they were watching the Democratic Convention very closely knowing that we would be, many of usco aring the messages from the two. Thats right. And theyre very understanding aw that idea that they are going to be d to the democrats. We saw some changes already in terms of the role call. There were people attacking the president ,i attackingce President Biden while also talking about the greatness of their state,r dems were more thghly that said im told e will be a lot of themes including policingk immigration, heal care, of course the coronavirus playing a big part. 7 like the democrats they will be talking in emotional terms. One interesting ing to no, the only living republican president , that is george w. Bush, will not be part of this Republican Convention, that tells you how much tension there remains betweethe republican rty and Establishment Republicans and president trum t woodrufhat is another contrast with the democratic from all the former livingar democratic president s. Yamiche alcindor at the white house. Us throughouwith this night and throughout the remainder of this week. Sense of this convention that is just beginng to unfold well turning throughout the night and all this week to a wide guests but lets start with our core group, that is syndicated columnist mark shields, New York Times columnist david brooks, Gary Abernathy, a contributing colume nus for the Washington Post based in ohio Cynthia Tucker say pulitzer prizewinning syndicated columnist based in alabama and here at the desk with me, amy walter otithe cook poal report. Welcome to all of you, it is so good to see you on this monday night as we begin to hear what the republicans have to sayy,. E did get a sampling of it as yamiche said from what thet presidd to say earlier today but what are you looking for from the republicans . They know this is eir this is their shot, if you will, over the next four days lyto fra come from behind in the polls ananmake mpression on the American People. An incumbent president rarely. Comes into the convention this fabehind in polls to his challenger. So that is already a challenge that he has in front of him,ub that rcansave in front of them. Which is not simply to convince between voters on the fence, keep with the incumbent or gwith the chal edge challenger. But he has to pull those away from joe biden. That is going to i be donea couple of ways. Either one, make the case why you are the stronger choice. Especially on the two issues that we know are royaling the dlg roiling the country, the coronavirus pandemic, and the economicallout from that, and of course rachel racial issues too becoming such big issue. On all three of those things, at least on o of those things the president is deaply underwater on those, so theto trust f is already pretty low. That leaves the prident with one other choic in order to get those vote ares back from joe biden. And that is make swra biden an unacceptable alternative. You heard some of that in charlotte, you heard it constaesly from the ent about how joe biden cant be trusted, that he is too old. He is really mentally in decline. And that he is going to be captive to the liberal interests. I think we will hear a lot of that this week. But i think what the president owally needs to do is to sh what his vision very clearly is for the next four years and how he is going to bring how wil he bring the country back from where we are todf ay. Woodrmark shields, what are you looking for from the republicans this week. How much oit will be a need for donald trump to tell us por about his vision as amy just said. And how much is it going to be okay for him to frngly jst ntinue to beat up on joe biden. Well, i thinkmy makes a good point as she always does, judy. But i really think donald trump is, whatevr else he is, he is unconventional. We would say at this point inca thaign the fight is about the middle of the electorate, and donald trump will make overtures and try to jump into the middle, grab a chunk of it. That in my judgment is not Donald Trumps approach. Dn ald trump has to, in the four polls i have seen, since the Democratic Convention, done all trumps Approval Rating is an average of 41 percent. Im sorry, you just cant get reelected on that. T but he has g make it into a choice, if it say referendum on done all trump, hes dead meat. So i think what you will see him doing and Th Convention trying it do this week, are two things. One, t reach out to sim pathetic trump voter whats may d t be involved or enga the electorate to try and engage them, to convince them that no only that he is the right guy but that this election is so are you not converting people, are you just energizing peope who ar otherwise not involved. And two, to discourage some people, democrats, maybe even republicans who were leaning democrats about joe biden, to raise doubts there. I think it is that simp sell. What is most remarkable to me, it made me think of whsa roosevel about her fawrt, he alwaywanted to be the corps at every feurn ral, the bride at every wedding and the baby at every cristening. He loves th setlight that Theodore Roosevelt. Dn ald trump makes Theodore Roosevelt a shrinking vy lot violet. He has to be wall to wall this week. Get ready for it. Woodruff david brooks, what are you looking for. Why do we have other speakers other than donald trump and the mediate family. This is going to be better than i expect it to be. And i realize that doesnt make an sense but show i think trump is a showman and will pulmel ing out of his hat. The fundamtals are promising for him or at least possible for him. The biggest divide is education level. Among ople of College Degrees, more than 50 go for themo ats. Among people with high school degrees, more than 60 or around 60 go for the republicans. And just a lot mr people with high school degrees34 of the lech trorrate electorate has a College Degree and twice as many have a high school degree. And so there is Fertile Ground out there and the model is the british conserative party, they were for centuries the land of gent ree party, now theyre the part of the British Working class and have built a gigantic majority. That is the model. Find a series of issues which organize people who are high school educated working class folks. D i think the democrats left n, opening on china, on immigratn a series of other issues, well see if donald trump can march through it. I think as mark said, his opti is a to knock down joe biden. But b, to say hey, you dont ke me but you need me. And that is mostly a poli argument rate now. Gary abernathy, what are you keeping an eye out for . Thanks for having me this week, im looking forward to it im honored to be re with your esteemed panel. Luke all of us i miss the excitement of the convention, i missed it last week, i wl miss it this week with the thousands cheering. That is just such a big pt of it but mark hit on something i wanted to reinforce which is y trum know from four years ago, has been doubling down on his base. He really makesvery little effort to expand that base. He doesnt reach to the so this week you are going to see a lot of red meat for his base. I know tonight i think we hav got scheduled mccloskeys, the couplerom st. Louis who were brand you wering their weapons as the black lives matter march was going past. And they say defending their property. A lot of people thin would you do that . His base which you know, largely supports aggressively the Second Amendment and fights any effort do anything to curtail guns or gun ownership, theyre going to love at. And i think that the effort is to appeal to the base andut out just enough, just enough to convince typically republicanleaning moderates because even if you dont like trump, were better than the alternative. And then what we are also going to see, judy, is whereas biden has been very limitedded, kind of very handled, says he is following the science and so i is going to kind of stay in the house. Trump is going to be everywhere this week. As you mentiod, whether he is speaking or not, he wants to show that contrast too. Woodruff Cynthia Tucker trk is your turn to tell us what you expect tonight. Judy, one. Things i am going to be looking for, not just tonight and not just from the president , buovt all, is the tone of the convention. The president and his allie have said that the democrats gave us a very dreary, de pressing view of the u. S. , that instead they will give us a bright, optimistics vision. Now that is not what the president did in his speech earlier today. He gave a rambling speech full of anger and grieveance and falsehoods, of course, so i will be looking to see that tone if will you. I will also b looking to see what exactly the speaker including the president say about what this election is framed aand that is the pandemic. Yes, the president will certainly be tring to draw contrast in terms of being out there, touching more people literally, i suspect than joe biden did. But i think he has to also ak knowledge the pain and trauma that so Many Americans have endured. And that is not smething that he has been able to do so far. And like gary, i will be looking to see if he reaches beyond his base. They have sa earlier that more americans are without College Degrees than have College Degrees. That is absolutely true. But many of tho aricans without College Degrees are le of color, latino voters and black voters and indianamerican voters and chineseamerican voters. And the president has done very little to reach out to them. So i will be looking toee if he tries to offer anything other than red meat to his base. Woodruff all right, well it is a lot to think abouts we get ready, the convention will get under wain a matter of minutes. Were going to pick up with live coverage starting at 9 00 eastern, but in the many time as we have been saying, these conventions this year are like no other inistory. Now amna is back with this look at this uni e momentd how we ended up here. I hummably and gratfully accept youromination. Four years ago in cleveland then candidate donald trump accepted the republican nomination for president in front of a roaring crowd thousands. And we will make America Great again. But this yearresident trump will accept his secretary term nomination from the quieter and emptier white house south lawn. Its bn a summer of back and rth, where the president and republican officials planning this years Republican National convention. I dont envy them but i do believe this wod have been a great learning experience to go executive producer for the Republican Conventions of 2012 and 2016, he knows intimately the challenge of engineering a nder ive vent like this normal circumstances. This year the degree of deficit is higher. Looking at what were going through with the pandemic and eing how people have had to adjust, all of how we do productions, it must be an undawnting task for the folks at the rnc, to pull up off a convention. As for democrats and their Convention Last week th pandemic forced republicans to dramically scale back plans. Today in charlotte, north st city thate would have been the center of the spectacle, near empty streets and event signs left behind. Theres been a lot of work in the last few weeks putting together and planning a lot of great content. Gop National Spokesperson liz harringtonold fushour that despite the challenges organizers remain optimistic. Wwant people to be engaed. We want more live coverage. We want to bring people together to experience some of these live speeches in a safe way. And the message really is that we love our coury, were fighting to defend dour freeoms and we have a big choiceon electioming up. The road leading up to this week rnc has been rocky. Tensions about the pandemics impact on convention plans started rising back in may when President Trump criticized North Carolina governor roy cooper foi his coronavirus guide lines. Threatening to move the condition vengs if they werent allowed to host a full inperson event. As the president and hers push to convene a several thousand person event, North Carolina officials push back. In a letter to the rnc governor otcooper argued that planning for a scaled down convention with fewer people coverings is a necessity. E in june, trump and the rnc announced they would be moving Key Convention events to jacksonville, florida. Continue to ris and the states started seeing record spikes, plans sfor jackville were scrapped the next month. President trump looking at the situation on the ground made the best decision for the citizens of jacksonville for our media who would have beenhe traveling there anall of our this week in North Carolina the Charlotte Convention center will host some Party Business like the delegates nominating the great state of connecticut is casting all 28 delegateo normally ands of delegates would participate. But this year only 336cement. Call. Ded this mornings role six delegates from each state and territory. I producedly cast 28 votes for president dn ald j trump. Other Key Convention ments will take place remotely, under the theme honoring the grea american story. And speakers will incde a mix of party lead ares and every day americans. Rhe president who relishes the raucous, livly experience will address support ares from a distance, asking them to