Five things to watch for at this year’s Democratic National Convention – and what they mean for the election

Previous conventions have proved quite unexciting. But this year’s gathering could have some significant moments.& Colin Young-Wolff / Alamy Stock Photo by Thomas Gift, UCL American politics junkies who can’t get enough of a wild 2024 campaign season will have another opportunity for must-see-TV at the upcoming Democratic National Convention (DNC), scheduled for August 19-22 in Chicago. At the Republican convention in Milwaukee last month, the former president, Donald Trump, was greeted as a deity-like figure by Maga voters after narrowly surviving an assassination attempt days earlier. Now it’s the Democrats’ turn to cheerlead their presidential nominee Kamala Harris and her new running mate Minnesota governor Tim Walz. The casting has changed. Harris, not President Joe Biden, will play the starring role, despite the newly anointed nominee never earning a primary vote. Yet the script of the show will stay the same: a four-day informercial packed with over-produced, ideological fervor. The upcoming Democratic convention could swing voters for or against Kamala Harris.& OOgImages/Alamy Live News When Biden withdrew from the race, delegates he’d accrued during the primaries became “uncommitted”. Although these delegates were free to back any candidate they wished, Harris quickly consolidated endorsements — including from the Clintons, the...