North Carolina's top health official says mass gatherings like the Republican National Convention will be a 'very big challenge' if COVID-19 cases continue to increase in the state, as they are currently.
But McDaniel said that the first week of July will be a critical period for planners. If state public health mandates are in place that would require an altered convention, the GOP would then begin working to modify its convention.
She said the GOP could break the event into smaller venues and left the door open to holding parts of it outside. The Republican convention's Charlotte host committee, which must raise $70 million to bring the event to the city, said Thursday that its"advanced planning and thorough organization have kept us ahead of schedule, and we will continue to plan while following local and state guidelines."Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper's order allows for venues like Charlotte's Spectrum Center to hold sporting events or concerts in Phase 2. The order creates an exemption to the ban on indoor mass gatherings with more than 10 people, allowing for"entertainers, performers and athletes, along with coaches, training, support and broadcast staff." Cohen said the provision was included to allow venues to hold events that could be broadcast or streamed on the web."That would be a spectator in my mind," Cohen said."They would be sitting in the spectator's part of the Spectrum Center. And these are the kind of details we would work out with the RNC. But the staff that we meant are the ones who actually work at the Spectrum Center." That means that if the RNC were held in June, there would only be 10 delegates allowed inside the arena. It's possible that Phase 2 could be relaxed, or the state could enter Phase 3, which would allow more people to gather at one time."If we continue to see our numbers go up and we aren't in a different position, then mass gatherings are going to be a very big challenge," she said. The number of COVID-19 patients in North Carolina is still increasing, though Cohen has said the state can move forward with a slow reopening because its testing capacity has increased and its hospitalizations are mostly level. The Democratic National Committee has said it may hold a virtual convention from Milwaukee. Its convention is scheduled to start Aug. 17, after being pushed back a month because of the pandemic.
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