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Now that the GOP convention is over, Milwaukee is weighing the benefits of hosting political rivals
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Now that the GOP convention is over, Milwaukee is weighing the benefits of hosting political rivals

MILWAUKEE — Downtown Milwaukee turned red last week as thousands of Republican National Convention delegates and other party loyalists gathered in Wisconsin’s largest Democratic stronghold to formally endorse Donald Trump as their nominee for president in the crucial swing state.

Outside the security zone where the convention was taking place, residents grumbled, ignored or shrugged. The event served to mobilize the GOP and give Trump momentum.

Milwaukee’s Democratic Mayor Cavalier Johnson immediately called the convention a success, even though he will now focus on ensuring Trump loses in November.

“We’ve shown that our city can host a big, huge event,” Johnson said Thursday. “That’s important for the tens of thousands of attendees and it’s important for the future of our hospitality industry here in Milwaukee.”

But it will take months to gauge the economic impact on Milwaukee, and complaints are mounting, including about blocked streets and storefronts, disappointing restaurant reservations and the deployment of out-of-town officers to police the city.

Residents also won’t soon forget Trump describing Milwaukee as “terrible” during a private meeting with congressional Republicans last month, though his defenders later suggested he was referring to crime or election concerns.

“I think there are a lot of people who are very upset about the ‘horrible’ stigma that Trump has given to the city,” Jill McCurdy, a retired Democratic woman, said Thursday as she walked through Red Arrow Park, where hundreds of people had protested days earlier. “Of course, we people who live here, especially those who have lived here our whole lives, don’t see it that way.”

McCurdy, 68, hopes Republican visitors will leave with a positive impression of the city, which is located on Lake Michigan about an hour’s drive north of Chicago, where Democrats are holding their convention next month.

But after talking to friends who own restaurants and were “pretty disappointed” with the business during the convention, she said she’s not sure the city benefited much from hosting the GOP’s big event.

Democrats need to perform well in Milwaukee to counter Republican forces in more rural parts of Wisconsin. Trump won the state narrowly in 2016, before losing it to President Joe Biden by just 21,000 votes four years later.

Wisconsin is one of the few true swing states that could go either way in this election and determine who wins the White House. Four of the last six presidential elections in Wisconsin have been decided by less than one percentage point.

As Tyler Schmitt, 28, and his partner Ken Ragan, 24, stretched out in the long grass in a park west of the convention grounds on Wednesday, they pondered the pros and cons of Milwaukee hosting.

Ragan said she could do without the traffic headaches. But Schmitt, an urban farmer, said he sees positives.

“From a small business perspective, it brings good energy to tourism and good press,” he said. “It’s pretty much downtown, and I think downtown is appropriate.”

But the downtown location still meant that law enforcement, including visiting officers from across the country, were on Milwaukee’s streets. On Tuesday, officers from Columbus, Ohio, shot and killed Samuel Sharpe, a man living in a homeless encampment about a mile (1.6 kilometers) from the convention site.

Sharpe had a knife in each hand and advanced toward another man, ignoring officers’ commands before shooting him, authorities said. The shooting remains under investigation.

Sharpe’s sister, Angelique Sharpe, blamed the presence of out-of-state officers for his death.

“I would rather have the Milwaukee Police Department that knows the people in this community than people who have no ties to your community and don’t care about our extended family members there,” she said.

At a rally after her brother was killed, Angelique Sharpe said her brother suffered from multiple sclerosis and acted in self-defense against a person who had threatened him in recent days.

Activists in the city also questioned whether the focus on Congress had minimized the more pressing, systemic problems in Milwaukee.

Hours before Trump took the stage at the convention to deliver his address to delegates on Thursday night, dozens of protesters rallied a block from the convention grounds to draw attention to the deaths of Sharpe and another Black man, D’Vontaye Mitchell, who died last month after being detained by security guards at a nearby hotel.

“They come here and make money off our city, but when we get hurt and we need them, they’re not here,” said Karl Harris, Mitchell’s cousin.

Associated Press writers Scott Bauer and Todd Richmond in Madison, Wisconsin, and Jake Offenhartz in Milwaukee contributed.