Northern Minnesota is under a new alert until Friday at 7 p.m.

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

Despite a pared-down version of the Republican National Convention schedule and a large protest march taking place outside, the republicans gaveled the convention to order this afternoon in St. Paul with hopes Sen. McCain would still speak Thursday night.

 Today's edited schedule at the Republican National Convention gave two Minnesota Republicans some extra time to focus on their own campaigns.

     Sixth District Congresswoman Michele Bachmann and 3rd District congressional candidate Erik Paulsen both spent the day outside the Xcel Center raising money and meeting potential voters. 

McCain campaign officials said in a conference call with reporters that they were optimistic that John McCain will accept the GOP nomination for president in person and for the rest of the convention.

They also said they will announce Tuesday's convention schedule on Tuesday morning and that they're confident that Gustav won't bring a total halt to the convention.

Republicans staged a subdued opening to
their storm-shadowed national convention on Monday, seeking aid for
the Gulf Coast victims of Hurricane Gustav as well as support to
send John McCain to the White House.

      Personal news blended with the political when McCain's running
mate announced that her 17-year-old unmarried daughter was
pregnant. "We're proud of Bristol's decision to have her baby and
even prouder to become grandparents," Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said
in a statement with her husband.

      Palin was in the Republican convention city, but not so McCain,
who visited a disaster relief center in Ohio in the hours before
delegates filed into their seats for the first time. 

Aides said he
was likely to deliver his nomination acceptance speech as scheduled
from the convention podium on Thursday.


      There was good money news for his fall campaign against Democrat
Barack Obama: His campaign reported raising at least $47 million in
August, his biggest monthly haul so far.


      The opening day program was shorn of political rhetoric, and
trimmed to two and a half hours from an intended seven in deference
to the threat Gustav posed to New Orleans and other areas along the
Gulf Coast.


      Rather than a keynote address or other political oratory, the
convention programmers gave McCain's wife, Cindy, and first lady
Laura Bush top billing to make televised appeals for help for
hurricane victims. The governors of four Gulf states were speaking
by videotape.


      Aides said they would determine the podium schedule for the
balance of the week on a day-to-day basis.


      The other business of the convention's opening session was
adoption of a party platform, a document that largely sidesteps the
national debate about the Iraq War.


      "The waging of war - and the achieving of peace - should never
be micromanaged in a party platform. ... In dealing with present
conflicts or future crises, our next president must preserve all
options," it said.

      The war is one of the key issues in the campaign, with Democrat
Barack Obama favoring the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops on a
16-month timetable and McCain saying a fixed schedule merely plays
into the hands of al-Qaida and others targeting Iraqi and U.S.
troops.


      The platform also calls for a constitutional amendment banning
abortion, the deportation of illegal immigrants convicted of gang
crimes and no new taxes. "The last thing America needs now is tax
hikes," it added.


      Outside the Xcel Center, protesters smashed windows, punctured
car tires and threw bottles during a march to the convention site.
Police used pepper spray in confrontations with demonstrators and
arrested five.

      Instead of the single march that organizers had hoped for,
fringe groups of anarchists and others wrought havoc along the
streets and delayed some delegates who were arriving at the last
minute.


      St. Paul police spokesman Tom Walsh said the five were arrested
for lighting a trash bin on fire.


      Hundreds of miles away, McCain visited a disaster relief center
in Waterville, Ohio, helping pack cleaning supplies and other items
into plastic buckets that will be sent to assist residents of the
Gulf Coast area. He said he hoped people would respond to the
hurricane by "using whatever gifts we have to help our fellow
Americans."


      Democrats also swung their attention to the hurricane.

      Obama urged hundreds of thousands of supporters to donate to the
Red Cross to help victims of Gustav. In a mass e-mailing - and the
same text-messaging system he used to announce his vice
presidential pick - he asked them to "please give whatever you/
can afford, even $10, to make sure the American Red Cross has the
resources to help those in the path of this storm."


      He scaled back a Labor Day speech to unions in Detroit to keep
attention on the Gulf Coast. After stops in Michigan and Wisconsin,
he was returning to his Chicago headquarters to monitor the storm's
progress and decide his schedule for the rest of the week.


      Obama has said he may visit storm-damaged areas once things have
"settled down."


      Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden canceled plans to
march in a Labor Day parade in Pittsburgh to monitor storm
developments. "Our focus right now should be on what's happening
in the Gulf," he said.


      As for Palin's daughter, McCain's campaign aides said Monday's
statement was issued to rebut Internet rumors that the governor's
four-month-old baby was, in fact, daughter Bristol's child.


      "Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize
very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they
will have the love and support of our entire family," Sarah and
Todd Palin said in the brief statement.


      The father was identified in the statement as Levi, but the
campaign said it was not disclosing his full name or age or how he
and Bristol know each other, citing privacy.


      Aides said Palin had informed McCain about her daughter's
pregnancy before she was picked to be his running mate. At several
points during the discussions, McCain's team warned the governor
that the scrutiny of her private life would be intense and that
there was nothing she could do to prepare for it.


      "Senator McCain's view is this is a private family matter. As
parents, (the Palins) love their daughter unconditionally and are
going to support their daughter," said McCain spokesman Steve
Schmidt.


      Prominent religious conservatives, many of them long cool to
McCain's candidacy, issued statements of support.
     

 James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, commended the
Palins for "for not just talking about their pro-life and
pro-family values, but living them out even in the midst of trying
circumstances."

Gallery

Despite a pared-down version of the Republican National Convention schedule and a large protest march taking place outside, the republicans gaveled the convention to order this afternoon in St. Paul with hopes Sen. McCain would still speak Thursday night.


Republicans gavel convention to order despite Gustav and protests

Go Deeper.

Like this?