COVID-19 UK Political Analysis by Tim Hames – 14th August 2020

If it had not been for the coronavirus crisis then last Sunday would have seen the closing ceremony of a doubtless thrilling Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo, and the eyes of the political world would have been turning to the US elections thereafter. The Democratic National Convention would have taken place next week at the Fiserv Forum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin and the Republican National Convention the week afterwards at the Spectrum Centre, Charlotte, North Carolina. These would have been massive events with several thousand party activists and supporters of presidential candidates, an utterly excessive media presence, a small army of diplomats from embassies or who had flown in, and would have concluded, as is traditional in American politics for some reason, with an unbelievably large number of balloons being released at the close from the ceiling.

It will not happen like that this year. The Democratic convention will be almost entirely virtual and its only serious order of business will be the nomination of ex-Vice President Joe Biden and his newly selected running mate, Senator Kamala Harris of California. The Republicans, mostly at the insistence of the White House, will hold some closed-door party meetings on the opening day of their convention, but, otherwise, it too will be a remote affair, with not much of consequence to occur beyond President Trump making his acceptance speech from an as yet not finally determined location and Vice President Mike Pence making his oration a day earlier. It will still be of interest to the media but it will not be the massive outing which it is customarily (and that is bad news for those who own bars and restaurants in Milwaukee and Charlotte). There will be huge interest in the proceedings from foreign representatives but at a distance. The balloon industry, which must have had a dire 2020, will not benefit from its spike in presidential election years. It will be even more surreal than the two conventions conducted in 1944, with World War II still raging, which, despite the conflict, went ahead with a semblence of normality. At least it will not have the madness of the notorious Democratic Convention of 1924 which took 103 ballots and ten days to select their candidate (who lost heavily in November).

Yet the two weeks to come in the United States and the final stretch of the campaign matter hugely to UK politics and to the Prime Minister and Government especially. This is because of the unique security relationship between the UK and the US dating back for more than 75 years, which has been placed under gigantic strain under the unpredictable Trump presidency, but also because of Brexit and the future mutual trade relationship.