Security Fears Increase Leading Up to Republican Convention

Concerns over the security at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland are ratcheting up leading up to the event scheduled for next week. They have become inflamed even further due to the recent incidents of racially motivated violence that have hit the country.

With GOP presumptive presidential nominee Donald Trump expected to accept in a formal manner the GOP’s nomination, a number of protest groups in favor as well as against the real estate mogul are preparing to carry out dozens of different marches and rallies across the city, which expects as many as 50,000 visitors during the quadrennial gathering of the GOP.

Already the different sides of the election are starting to point fingers are one another playing the blame game.

Throughout the primary season, Trump’s campaign seemed to have violence and racial tensions following it both inside the events he had as well as in the streets outside those same events.

As the convention arrives amidst a rising tide of national anger against violence by police in the death of a pair of African Americans and the anxieties tied to the ambush that killed five Dallas police officers last week, has many worried about what could take place next week.

Making matters even worse, the open-carry gun laws in Ohio have the head of the group Bikers for Trump saying that the streets of Cleveland could become the wild, wild west.

State law in Ohio does not regulate carrying guns, meaning entrants to the GOP convention’s secure zone of 1.3 square miles are not allowed to bring in amongst a number of other things, weapons such as hatches, axes, swords, slingshots, pellet guns, BB guns and metal knuckles, but have openly hold their own live firearms.

However, no weapons of any kind will be allowed inside the arena where the convention will take place.

The police department has spent millions of dollars to protect its employees with tactical weaponry and body armor. The Bikers for Trump have promised to stand with the police if they need to.

Adding to worries is that the police department is currently under oversight by the Justice Department due to being cited two years ago for what the feds called a “pattern or practice of using excessive force.”

At the city’s Cleveland Clinic both doctors as well as surgeons have been told they must remain on call in preparation of a situation that the hospital gets cut from any outside aid, for the four days of the convention.