House and Senate leaders are speaking at the RNC as they fight to regain or maintain majorities in November’s elections

The “law and order” message Trump hopes to advance Thursday comes at tense moment. Kenosha, Wisconsin, remains on edge after the police shooting of a Black man. Many professional athletes were continuing a boycott, though NBA playoff games were scheduled to resume. In Washington, a large racial justice demonstration was being planned for Friday.

The tinder-box atmosphere surrounding the President’s address is not an entirely unfamiliar or uncomfortable place for Trump, and in some ways fits squarely into the theme of his convention and campaign: that Democratic-run areas will devolve into chaos should Joe Biden win.

One of Trump’s top advisers, Kellyanne Conway, appeared to acknowledge as much in an interview earlier Thursday, quoting an earlier speaker during the convention: “The more chaos and anarchy and vandalism and violence reigns, the better it is for the very clear choice on who’s best on public safety and law and order,” she said. 

Speakers on Thursday — including Ann Dorn, the widow of a police captain who was killed during violence in St. Louis, and Patrick Lynch, the president of a New York Police Department union — seemed designed to advance that message.

But in refusing the address or even acknowledge the circumstances that have led to protests in Wisconsin, Trump also seems to undercut the assertions made over and over during the convention that he is attuned to the issues of the Black community and eager to help.

Those themes also seemed poised to arise again Thursday, with planned speeches from Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, Trump’s sole Black Cabinet member, and Ja’Ron Smith, the highest-ranking Black official at the White House. Also scheduled to speak is Alice Johnson, whose life sentence for a drug violation was commuted by Trump.

Given an opportunity earlier Thursday to comment on the shooting of Jacob Blake that precipitated protests in Kenosha this week, Trump instead pivoted to his familiar pledge to tamp down on violence.

“We will put out the fire. We will put out the flame,” Trump said during a visit to FEMA headquarters, where he received a briefing on Hurricane Laura. “We will stop the violence very quickly.”