What Went Down On Night 2 Of The RNC

Shom, I actually think it’s great for Trump that a lot of GOP members of Congress don’t like him and don’t want to appear here, at least in terms of having an interesting convention. Nothing made the DNC more boring than the times when it felt like they had to feature politicians who are close to Biden or who were on the vice-presidential shortlist but gave boring speeches that didn’t add much.

The Hatch Act, which I just mentioned, is a federal law that prohibits government officials from campaigning on the job or in their official capacity. Trump, as president, is not subject to the Hatch Act, so he’s allowed to deliver his RNC speech from the grounds of the White House. (Pence, as vice president, is also not covered by it.) But any other federal employee is, which makes all of the White House-adjacent events very dicey. It is also the reason that Pompeo, a diplomat, is being attacked for delivering his speech while in Jerusalem. All of this is somewhat theoretical, though, since although House Democrats are investigating Pompeo’s appearance, any enforcement of the Hatch Act would have to come from the executive branch — which seems very unlikely to happen, especially since an independent agency has repeatedly concluded that Trump aides like Kellyanne Conway have violated the Hatch Act, and there haven’t been any consequences.

Maine is a lot more conservative that you might think. Here’s a dispatch from when I went waaaaay up north in 2016.