UW-Milwaukee Political Scientist on Milwaukee Hosting 2024 Republican National Convention

Monday, August 8th, 2022 -- 8:04 AM

(Bob Hague, WRN) Milwaukee will host the 2024 Republican National Convention.

The convention is likely to provide a boost to the city’s profile. “I think it has real potential to be beneficial to the city.” Thomas Holbrook is a political scientist at UW Milwaukee. He says national conventions aren’t always enthusiastically welcomed by residents of host cities.

“If you ask the city leaders, they tell you ‘oh yeah there's a net positive.’ But I think probably if you ask the people who live in the cities you'd get much more mixed opinions.”

Holbrook continued talking about potential benefit, “I'm not talking dollars and cents necessarily. But I think in terms of sort of prestige as a major city, putting Milwaukee a little bit more on the map, certainly high visibility for at least a few weeks going into the convention and then of course convention week.”

Not everyone is pleased by the news that the Democratic stronghold of Milwaukee will host the 2024 Republican National Convention. But UW Milwaukee political scientist Thomas Holbrook notes it’s not an unusual situation.

“The truth of the matter is I think virtually every large city in this country is a Democratic city. So it's not really that unusual for the Republican Party to hold their convention in a Democratic city. Even in conservative states, the cities tend to be pretty Democratic.”

Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel announced the pick Friday during the RNC’s August meeting in Chicago. That came after officials in Nashville had rejected a preliminary contract to host the convention.

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