Donald Trump to be formally nominated for election as Republican convention gets underway – US politics live

While the Republican National Convention holds a series of events today in Washington DC and Charlotte, North Carolina, let’s not forget about Jacksonville, Florida.

When Covid-19 caused officials in Charlotte, North Carolina to institute social distancing requirements Trump balked, and began an effort to move the convention to Florida.

But soon cases of Covid-19 began to balloon in Florida. The state has been one of the worst hit in the country. Eventually, Trump gave up his push to have a full-scale convention in the state, conceding it was “not the right time”.

Well, now we have some evidence of how history repeats itself. Almost 100 years ago, Florida officials expressed “concern” and “regret” about lack of public health funding. A similar story has taken place over the last decade, as Florida slashed local public health funding under Republican leadership.

Today, Florida has had more than 600,000 cases, more than 10,000 deaths, and testing is falling off even as positivity rates remain high at more than 13%, according to Johns Hopkins University.

DeJoy has taken today’s hearing as an opportunity to distance himself from recent controveries at the postal service. Here’s reporting from The Guardian’s voting rights reporter Sam Levine, who is following the hearings closely:

And as a short recap, here is some of Sam’s reporting from last week, when DeJoy appeared at a Senate hearing:

America’s postmaster general, Louis DeJoy, conceded on Friday he had implemented recent changes that led to mail delays at the United States Postal Service (USPS) but said he would not reverse the decision to remove mail equipment ahead of the election.

DeJoy, a major Republican donor without prior USPS experience, made his first appearance before Congress amid widespread scrutiny over the mail delays and his management of the agency since taking over in June.

The House Oversight and Reform committee hearing on mail delays is now underway. Postmaster general Louis DeJoy is warning in prepared remarks that Americans should request a mail-in ballot at least 15 days in advance of election day, Nov. 3, and return it at least a week before the election.

DeJoy said his remarks, “should in no way be misconstrued to imply that we lack confidence in our ability to deliver those ballots,” DeJoy told the House panel in prepared remarks obtained by The Associated Press. “We can, and will, handle the volume of Election Mail we receive.”

The pre-election warning “has nothing to do with recent operational initiatives or concerns about delayed mail,” DeJoy said, and is merely intended to help ensure that ballots will be delivered on time and counted.

“While we will do whatever we can to deliver ballots even when they are mailed at the last second, it should also be obvious to fair-minded election officials that urging voters to mail back their ballot at least a week before the deadline is a simple and straightforward step to ensure that ballots are delivered on time and, most importantly, counted under state law,” he said.