Report: Jacksonville now frontrunner for RNC convention

Jacksonville has been tentatively chosen as the new site for the Republican presidential convention, according to The Washington Post. Tennessee Republicans had hoped to draw the event to Nashville.

Officials tell the paper many of the lower-profile meetings would still take place in Charlotte, N.C., while holding the finale elsewhere. The move is aimed at shielding the party from lawsuits over moving the event after it couldn’t resolve a dispute with the state’s Democratic mayor over social distancing requirements amid the coronavirus pandemic.

“We can’t do social distancing,” Trump told Gov. Roy Cooper in a phone call last month, according to the Post. 

The dispute led governors in Georgia, Florida, and Tennessee to lobby the White House to bring the event to their states.