The city for our parties' convention / nomination / election kick-off is picked well in advance. There is no normal type of city. Republicans want to win Wisconsin this year, so their convention is in Milwaukee. Democrats want to show unity so their convention is in the democratic strong hole of Chicago, Illinois.
But then Gaza happened. And now the Gaza protests. They are petrified of a repeat of the 1968 convention.
In 1968 there was a full-scale rebellion at the Democratic convention.
There were Anti-Vietnam War protests that got very violent. There was also a very divided convention, which ultimately nominated Hubert Humphrey. He was LBJ's Vice President and pro war. The other choice - wildly more popular - choice was Robert F Kennedy, who was very anti-war. But RFK was killed during the California Campaign. And so the anti-war sentiment was ignored.
The riots occurred that probably killed H Humphrey's chances. Nixon campaigned as the law and order candidate - and won. The Chicago Convention also broke the Southern Democrats from the party and George Wallace ran on a purely anti-black anti-integration ticket.
If you want to see a great depiction of this, see: The Trial of the Chicago 7.
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