Axios

Joe Biden’s calculation is clear: he wants to scare the hell out of America about four more years of President Trump and keep the camera, focus and media trained on his opponent, not himself.

Why it matters: Biden said this week he plans a partial return to the road after Labor Day, with targeted visits to swing states — but strictly within the guidelines of safe crowd sizes, social distancing and guidance from scientists and public health officials.

Team Trump officials told Axios they're using the same tactic, with a suburban twist, that worked for the campaign in 2016 when they portrayed a country at risk from "violent" immigrants flooding the U.S.-Mexico border:

Why it matters: They're trying to scare swing voters away from the Biden-Harris ticket by defining the duo as a conduit for the "radical left."

Many of this year's on-the-fly convention innovations — including Democrats' virtual roll-call road trip and Republicans' use of the White House for political pageantry — may well outlast the pandemic.

Why it matters: Conventions have entered a new era where the TV show will push aside many of the parties' charming but archaic traditions.

The most viral stories about the Republican convention were largely about non-political speakers, while the Democratic convention stories focused on the political leaders who were the official stars of the convention, according to exclusive data from NewsWhip.

Why it matters: The GOP convention in particular highlighted how speakers from outside of the political arena who haven't been bloodied and bruised by political fights were most effective at setting social media on fire.

Increasing partisanship, competing streaming options and the mostly virtual nature of this year's programming may help explain why TV ratings for both conventions were way down compared with 2016.

Why it matters: Ratings are not a proxy for popularity or voter enthusiasm, but they do provide a loose sense of which party and figures are capturing the attention of the country.

Three New York City public housing tenants, interviewed for a video bashing Mayor Bill de Blasio that aired Thursday during the Republican convention, told the New York Times they didn't know how it would be used.

What they're saying: "I am not a Trump supporter," one of the tenants, Claudia Perez, told The Times. "I am a first-generation Honduran."

Democrats close to Joe Biden increasingly fear the looting and violence in cities could help President Trump, especially among the few undecided or wavering Americans.

Why it matters: This is a huge story that helps explain the state of the race, with some Democrats panicking that Trump could win.

President Trump on Saturday tweeted a series of digs at former national security adviser John Bolton, Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward and his own niece Mary Trump — all of whom have written tell-all books on the president.

The big picture: Bolton's 2020 book served as fuel to Trump's post-impeachment fire, alleging that the president green-lit Uighur concentration camps in China, among other things.

Two generations of Kings spoke at the Lincoln Memorial on Friday as part of the March on Washington that honored the 57th anniversary of MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech.

The big picture: Black people are reeling after a summer that opened with the police killing of George Floyd and is closing with the police shooting of Jacob Blake, who was paralyzed and spent time handcuffed to a hospital bed after being shot seven times in the back.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed a bill into law Friday banning the sale of fruit, menthol and mint-flavored cigarettes and vaping cartridges in retailers across the state effective Jan. 1, 2021.

Why it matters: The ban is part of a wider campaign to curb youth vaping, though the legislation does not apply to the online sale of tobacco products, which cross state lines, and does not apply to flavored premium cigars and loose pipe tobacco, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

About 23.8 million people watched President Trump's speech at the Republican National Convention Thursday, according to early figures from Nielsen. That's about 3% fewer viewers than the 24.6 million who tuned into Joe Biden's speech at the Democratic National Convention last week.

The big picture: TV ratings for the RNC were down about 21% on average this year across all four nights compared to 2016. They were also down 10% compared to the 2020 DNC.

Former First Lady Michelle Obama said in a social media post Friday that she is "devastated" by the police shooting of Jacob Blake and killing of two protesters this week in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

What she's saying: “These past few months, I’ve been thinking a lot about what our kids are seeing every day in this country — the lack of empathy, the division stoked in times of crisis, the age-old and systemic racism that’s been so prominent this summer," Obama said. "Sometimes they see it on the news. Sometimes they see it from the White House Rose Garden. And sometimes they see it from the back seat of a car."

Go deeper... Michelle Obama: "Donald Trump is the wrong president for our country ... it is what it is"

Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress that the U.S. armed forces will not be involved in the election process or resolving a possible disputed vote this November, according to comments released Friday to AP.

Why it matters: The statements from the top U.S. military officer come after President Trump floated delaying the election, repeatedly claimed without evidence that the upcoming election will be rigged or affected by widespread voter fraud, and refused to say whether he will accept the election results if he loses.

The dividing line between Fox News and President Trump has become blurred, with each increasingly relying on the other to accomplish their goals.

Axios Re:Cap speaks with Brian Stelter, the CNN media critic and author of a new book about Fox News called "Hoax," about the network's evolution, who really calls the shots, and what Sean Hannity thinks about Trump.

The handcuffs attached to the hospital bed of Jacob Blake — who is paralyzed from the waist down following a police shooting in Kenosha, Wisconsin — were removed Friday afternoon, Blake's attorney, Patrick Cafferty, told CNN.

Details: At a press conference Friday, Kenosha Police chief Daniel Miskinis said Blake had been handcuffed to the bed and guarded by officers inside the hospital for "an outstanding warrant for third-degree sexual assault," according to NPR.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) in a statement Friday said he "fell short of [his] own standard," by choosing not to wear a face mask at President Trump's Republican National Convention acceptance speech on Thursday night.

Why it matters: Former North Carolina state Sen. Cal Cunningham, the Democratic nominee to challenge Tillis for his seat in November, accused his opponent of hypocrisy for stressing the importance of wearing a mask, but foregoing any face covering during Trump's speech.

Two generations of Kings spoke at the Lincoln Memorial Friday as part of the March on Washington that honored the 57th anniversary of MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech.

The big picture: Black people are reeling after a summer that opened with the police killing of George Floyd and is closing with the police shooting of Jacob Blake, who was paralyzed and spent time handcuffed to a hospital bed after being shot seven times in the back.

President Trump on Friday signed a full pardon for Alice Johnson, who had her life sentence for a nonviolent drug offense commuted by the president in 2018.

The backdrop: Johnson spoke at the Republican National Convention on Thursday to celebrate the First Step Act, the Trump-backed bipartisan criminal justice bill that passed six months after her commutation.

The Food and Drug Administration on Friday ousted its top spokesperson, Emily Miller, after less than two weeks on the job, reports the New York Times.

Why it matters: Miller's removal comes amid disagreements over the FDA's communication strategy and controversy surrounding its emergency use authorization of convalescent blood plasma as a coronavirus treatment.

The NBA and its players' union agreed on Friday to resume the league's playoffs on Saturday after players refused to take the floor for a number of games this week in protest of the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wis.

Why it matters: As part of the agreement, the league agreed to work with the players to work toward three initiatives focused around social justice, civic engagement and voting rights.

The lull in transit use during COVID-19 has given officials room to experiment with public transportation for all communities, Chicago's transportation commissioner, Gia Biagi, said at an Axios event on Friday.

The big picture: Americans have shied away from public transportation during the coronavirus pandemic. But Biagi argues that declines in ridership provide a window to innovation that wouldn't otherwise be available.

Former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said he expects a bipartisan push in Congress to shore up public transportation during the coronavirus pandemic, as it did for the airlines earlier this year and is under pressure to do again.

The state of play: During an Axios virtual event, LaHood underscored that Americans are using cars, rather than public transit, during COVID-19 pandemic. Public transportation as a result has subsequently seen a massive drop in ridership and revenue along with it.

RNC week: Axios' chief technology correspondent Ina Fried hosted a conversation on the future of how people get around in the era of COVID-19, featuring former Secretary of Transportation and co-chair of Building America's Future Ray LaHood, Commissioner of the Chicago Department of Transportation Gia Biagi and League of Cities CEO Clarence Anthony.

Ray LaHood discussed how the efforts to create more sustainable public transit have stalled with COVID-19, and called on the federal government to financially support existing transit systems.

• On the need for the financial support: "Just as the federal government stepped up for the airlines...there will have to be a huge influx of federal resources in order to sustain transit systems until they can get back to some sort of sort of normalcy in terms of ridership."

Gia Biagi highlighted how COVID-19 has shifted people's mindset about what city streets can look like with fewer cars, and unpacked the existing inequities in Chicago's public transportation system.

• How micromobility can supplement existing transit in Chicago: "What we're trying to do is connect the dots with micromobility and investments in the actual infrastructure. [Where we're seeing a need] also overlaps where we've seen the effects of structural racism and disinvestment that are fundamentally policy choices that have been made for many years."

Clarence Anthony discussed transit equity in cities, and the need for federal and state support to ensure that people have equal access to public transportation.

• "What is our role as city leaders? It is to make sure that the equity is brought into the policy and the process and that we demand that all of those services — like ride share and public services — are brought to all communities in an equal way."

Axios VP of Events Kristin Burkhalter hosted a View from the Top segment with Lyft Chief Policy Officer Anthony Foxx, and discussed Lyft's role in the transportation ecosystem and how they're contributing to racial justice efforts.

• On Lyft's relationship to public transit: "We feel like we're part of the ecosystem. We've never wanted to overtake public transit because we believe public transit is an essential service that only the public can do."

Thank you Lyft for sponsoring this event.

The House Foreign Affairs Committee announced Friday that it will launch contempt proceedings against Secretary of State Mike Pompeo over his refusal to comply with a subpoena for records related to the State Department's involvement in attempts to link Joe Biden to corruption in Ukraine.

Why it matters: Democrats on the committee say that Pompeo gave similar documents to Senate Republicans, alleging he has undertaken a "transparently political misuse of Department resources" and shown "an unprecedented record of obstruction and defiance of the House’s constitutional oversight authority."

Israel’s airport authority on Friday listed the departure of a commercial Israeli airliner to the United Arab Emirates on its planned schedule for the first time.

Why it matters: The milestone flight is another sign of progress in the U.S.-brokered normalization deal between the two countries that was announced two weeks ago.

Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris told NBC's "Today" that the police officer that shot Jacob Blake multiple times in the back, leaving him paralyzed, should face charges, based on what she saw in the video of the incident.

Why it matters: It is rare for officers to be charged in the deaths of Black Americans, as seen in an Axios review of the most prominent cases of police killings.

The NBA and WNBA have frequently taken the lead on athlete activism and social issues, including the Black Lives Matter movement.

Why it matters: This is at least partly due to their racial make-up — and not just at the player level. Both leagues received A+ scores for racial hiring in 2019, per The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Friday told "Fox & Friends" about his confrontation with protesters following President Trump's RNC acceptance speech on the streets of Washington, D.C., characterizing the group as a "mob."

Worth noting: While protesters urged Paul to acknowledge Breonna Taylor, who was killed by police earlier this year in Louisville, the libertarian-leaning senator introduced a bill in June in her name to ban "no-knock" warrants like the one that was used by police in the incident that led to her death.

CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta said Friday that some attendees at President Trump's acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention are likely to contract the coronavirus due to the event's lack of social distancing.

The state of play: The event on the White House's South Lawn saw more than 1,000 attendees in close proximity. Most did not wear masks and were seated inches apart.

The sports walk-out first started by NBA players after the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wis., continued through Thursday, with even more leagues joining the historic strike.

• NBA: All three playoff games were postponed for the second straight day, but players met and voted to resume the season by this weekend, likely on Saturday.

Amid a national reckoning on race that has consumed the sports world, NBA players are poised to shape the conversation — and perhaps even influence the upcoming election.

The state of play: The NBA bubble has been politicized from the start, with social justice messages everywhere. But the Milwaukee Bucks' strike on Wednesday set a new bar and made the NBA a leader in a movement it had previously only participated in.

President Trump's convention speech last night did not frame the coronavirus as a thing that's over, the way some of the other programming during the convention had.

What happened: He acknowledged the 180,000 Americans who have died, and the toll on their families, and used the present and future tenses to describe a response that is still ongoing, but he painted a rosier picture of the U.S. response, and made bolder predictions, than the facts fully support.

After spending four years pushing away all but his hardest core, President Trump used the Republican National Convention to try to belatedly reel back big swaths of the electorate who like his policies but don't like him.

The state of play: The Trump campaign is gambling that even Americans who hate his style will ultimately vote on what they think affects them most directly.

Addressing a packed crowd on the White House South Lawn Thursday night, President Trump accepted the GOP nomination in a speech that painted Joe Biden as a "Trojan horse for socialism" who will not have "the strength to stand up to wild-eyed Marxists like Bernie Sanders and his fellow radicals."

Why it matters: "This is the most important election in the history of our country," Trump said in a refrain that Joe Biden and the Democratic Party have also stressed. "There has never been such a difference between two parties, or two individuals, in ideology, philosophy, or vision than there is right now."

CNN debuted a new chyron on Thursday to fact-check Donald Trump's acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in real-time.

Why it matters: News networks have faced sustained criticism for airing Trump speeches and press conferences live, instead of layering on more fact-checking.

Ivanka Trump sought to humanize her father and his response to the coronavirus pandemic at the Republican National Convention Thursday, saying she has "seen the pain in his eyes when he receives updates on the lives that have been stolen by this plague."

Why it matters: RNC speakers spent little time discussing the pandemic over the course of four days of programming — especially compared to the Democratic convention, where it was a central focus. The most common references came as speakers pointed to the strong economy that Trump presided over before COVID-19 threw the world into chaos.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) attacked Joe Biden's foreign policy record in his speech at the Republican National Convention on Thursday, arguing that the former senator and vice president has "aided and abetted China’s rise for fifty years with terrible trade deals."

Why it matters: Cotton, a hardline conservative and China hawk, is widely seen as a potential 2024 Republican candidate for president. The Trump campaign and Biden campaign have gone back and forth in accusing each candidate of being soft on China.

Alice Johnson, who had her life sentence for a nonviolent drug offense commuted by President Trump in 2018, praised the president's commitment to criminal justice reform at the Republican National Convention on Thursday.

The big picture: Johnson celebrated the First Step Act, the Trump-backed bipartisan criminal justice bill that passed six months after her commutation. The bill led to the release of at least 3,000 inmates by the end of 2019, according to NBC News.

President Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani took on the "unprecedented wave of lawlessness" that has swept across the U.S. at the RNC Thursday night, accusing the Black Lives Matter movement and Antifa of turning peaceful protests into "vicious, brutal riots."

Why it matters: As mayor of New York City, Giuliani was famous for championing a controversial record of crime-fighting, including policies like stop-and-frisk. He tore into his successor Bill De Blasio for allowing crime to rise in New York, and accused Joe Biden of being a "Trojan horse" for progressives "waiting to execute their pro-criminal, anti-police, socialist policies."

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson defended President Trump against accusations of racism at the Republican National Convention on Thursday.

Why it matters: Carson, the only Black member of Trump's Cabinet, has become a loyal ally and defender of the president since running against him in the 2016 Republican primary.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) stuck to the basics in his endorsement of President Trump at the Republican National Convention on Thursday, casting the Democratic Party as too focused on elites and dismissive of "middle America" and "flyover country."

Why it matters: The Senate is "the firewall" against the Democratic agenda if Trump is defeated in November, McConnell stressed as he called on voters to "support Republican Senate candidates across the country." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has referred to the GOP-controlled Senate as McConnell's legislative "graveyard."

President Trump will officially accept the Republican nomination for president before a crowd of more than 1,000 people on the White House South Lawn Thursday night. Meanwhile, demonstrators gathered outside in Lafayette Park to protest his administration.

Why it matters: The president's re-election campaign and the Republican National Convention have essentially transformed the South Lawn of the White House into a political stage.

Ja'Ron Smith, deputy assistant to the president, testified to President Trump's commitment to Black communities at the Republican National Convention Thursday, saying: "I have seen his true conscience."

Why it matters: Smith is the highest-ranking Black official in the White House. Trump has taken to calling him "my star" in meetings, according to a New York Times profile.