Editor’s Note: This was excerpted from the August 28 edition of CNN’s Meanwhile in America, the daily email about US politics for global readers. Click here to read past editions and subscribe.
Kellyanne Conway — whom history will remember for the administration-defining phrase “alternative facts” — ignored one final firestorm on her way out of the West Wing on Thursday, as she concluded her spell as Trump’s counselor.
“The more chaos and anarchy and vandalism and violence reigns, the better news for the very clear choice on who’s best on public safety and law and order,” Conway told Fox News, exposing the President’s reliance on fear to keep millions of Americans from voting for Biden.
As protests escalate over the police shooting of Jacob Blake, the former vice president has said Blake deserves justice – while warning that violence and looting are not the way to bring it about.
And he’s turning Trump’s predictions of anarchy if Biden wins the election back against the President, pointing out that the current turbulence and unrest is happening in “Donald Trump’s America.”
“These guys are rooting for violence,” Biden told CNN on Thursday, “That is what it is all about.”
Biden also said he’s ready to travel to Kenosha County, Wisconsin, where Blake was shot, underscoring how tensions there could make the state a petri dish for the clash over law, order and race that could influence the destiny of the presidency itself.
Kenosha County might be the most swingable district in the most swingable state in the entire election. In 2016, Trump prevailed over Hillary Clinton there by 47.5% to 47.2% – or by just 238 votes. He pulled out the Badger State as a whole by 22,748 votes out of nearly 3 million cast. This year, Wisconsin will be one of a handful of battlegrounds that decide November’s election.
Most recent polls show Biden with a slight lead, but anger, grief and fear are still too fresh in Kenosha to predict this week’s fallout in November.
Will Kenosha voters embrace Democrats’ calls for police reform and a nationwide accounting of systemic racism? Or are more nodding along with Trump’s lurid claims that protests amount to left-wing “fascism” that seeks to engulf White suburbs in flames?