The Brief

When a stranger called offering Dulce Volantin some financial help, she was skeptical.

"Sounds kind of shady," she recalls thinking.

At the time, Volantin and her partner, Valarie Zayas, were renting a bed at a place on Venice Beach in Los Angeles. "Dormitory-style living," Zayas says. The women had met in prison a few years before, after each had been involved with gangs, and they were over-the-moon happy to have found love. But Volantin had suffered bad bouts of mental illness that required hospitalization. Zayas was hustling temp jobs to supplement Dulce's disability aid.

They'd slept in their car, then lost it. Stayed with family for too long. Then started donating plasma and selling some of their clothes to pay for motels. "By the seventh day, you don't have anything in your pocket no more," Volantin says.

Despite her doubts, she returned that phone call — and it turned out to be not only for real, but also life changing.

Valaria Zayas (left) and Dulce Volantin (center) walk down the hallway of their apartment building with case manager Hannia Centeno.

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The call was from the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, part of a first-of-its-kind experiment to try and curb homelessness numbers, which keep going up despite massive spending. On average, for every 207 Angelenos who exit homelessness every day, 227 others fall into it.

Los Angeles is housing more people than ever, and building lots more low-income housing, yet it can't keep pace with this ever-rising number of people who end up in cars, tents and shelters.

"It's a bucket with a hole in it, so we've got to do something ... to fill that hole," says Dana Vanderford, who helps lead the department's Homelessness Prevention unit.

With that goal, the pilot program is using artificial intelligence to predict who's most likely to land on the streets, so the county can step in to offer help before that happens.

Dana Vanderford leads the Homelessness Prevention unit within the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services in Alhambra, Calif. "We have clients who have understandable mistrust of systems," Vanderford says. They've "experienced generational trauma. Our clients are extremely unlikely to reach out for help."

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The program tracks data from seven county agencies, including emergency room visits, crisis care for mental health, substance abuse disorder diagnosis, arrests and sign-ups for public benefits like food aid. Then, using machine learning, it comes up with a list of people considered most at-risk for losing their homes. Vanderford says these people aren't part of any other prevention programs.

"We have clients who have understandable mistrust of systems," she says. They've "experienced generational trauma. Our clients are extremely unlikely to reach out for help."

Instead, 16 case managers divide up the lists and reach out to the people on them, sending letters and cold calling.

It's surprisingly hard to offer people thousands of dollars over the phone

Elizabeth Juarez, case manager at the Homelessness Prevention unit, cold calls potential clients to enroll them in the program. She says when people's lives are unstable their numbers and addresses often change. When she does get through, she finds many people facing eviction or dealing with domestic violence.

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Sitting in a spare office one recent morning with her laptop and cellphone, case manager Elizabeth Juarez starts dialing. A major challenge is that the county never reaches half the people on its lists. Juarez says when people's lives are unstable their numbers and addresses often change. When she does get through, some people are facing eviction or dealing with domestic violence. Every now and then she'll reach a person who's already lost their housing, so then she has to tell them that they no longer qualify for the prevention program.

While most people need rent help, Juarez says that's not always the most urgent problem. She's used the allocated money for payday loan debt, appliances, laptops and, recently, an e-bike for someone whose mental illness made it difficult to take public transportation.

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Some actually decline the help, telling her others need it more. And then there are the skeptics. "They kind of just give you the runaround," Juarez says. "Maybe they're not trusting, and I totally understand." She'll call back a couple times just in case they come around.

On this morning, though, it isn't long before Juarez gets someone on the phone. She is cheerful and patient with the man, knowing it can take a minute to process what's happening. She explains how the program offers a case manager to work with people for four to six months. They'll help figure out how to spend $4,000 to $6,000 dollars in aid, money which he won't have to pay back.

"Straight to a bank account?" the man asks. No, Juarez explains, it goes to third-party vendors to cover bills like rent, utilities, groceries or other monthly expenses. She tells him the main reason is to avoid jeopardizing any public benefits that might be cut if someone's income increases.

The man mentions he's renting from a relative and recently had a seizure. Yes, he says, he'd like to sign up.

While most people need rent help, Juarez says that's not always the most urgent problem. She's used the allocated money for payday loan debt, appliances, laptops and, recently, an e-bike for someone whose mental illness made it difficult to take public transportation.

"We discuss, 'How is your living situation?' '' she says. "So while somebody might be physically housed, is it safe in there? Do you have a bed? Do you have what you need in your home to thrive and feel stable?"

A sudden death pushes a retired grandfather's finances over the edge

Ricky Brown is a new client in the prevention program. The 65-year-old was a handyman but went on disability after injuring his back when he was in his 40s. He was barely getting by in a one-bedroom apartment in L.A.'s Crenshaw neighborhood, making ends meet on his income from Social Security and odd jobs. Then his ex-wife died suddenly a year ago. She'd been raising their three grandsons, because Brown's daughter and her husband are addicted to pills. Now, he's taken in the boys and it's been a financial blow.

"I had a little money put away, but boy ... I went through it," he says. "Because these kids eat."

On a recent morning, county case manager Fred Theus visits to work out a plan. They sit in Brown's living room, where there are now bunk beds for the three boys and large plastic bins overflowing with their clothes and sneakers. 11-year-old Ziare is hanging out with his phone while his brothers are at after-school homework time.

Homelessness Prevention Unit case manager Fred Theus visits newly enrolled client Ricky Brown in Los Angeles. Brown desperately wants to find a bigger place so his three grandsons don't have to sleep in the living room.

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Theus ticks off a list of needs: car repairs, paying back due rent and utilities, restoring food aid for the boys. They were cut off a year ago, though Brown has no idea why. Theus guesses it may have been a paperwork snafu.

Then the biggest challenge: Brown is desperate to find a two-bedroom place for the boys. "They want to play," he says. "They want open space and they can't get it."

Theus says it will be difficult to find anywhere Brown can afford, so they'll have to try for a housing voucher to bring down his expenses. That, combined with boosting his income through food stamps and cash aid, are the best hope for making him self-sufficient.

Ricky Brown says he feels blessed that the homelessness prevention program reached out to help him. Still, he says, "I stay worried about a lot of stuff every day."

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"That's our main goal," Theus says, "to make sure they are able to take care of themselves after we're done."

But there aren't nearly enough federal housing vouchers to meet the need, and Theus says wait times have gotten longer as cities try to help the growing number of people who are unhoused. Even scoring a voucher is no guarantee. In fact, Brown had one a decade ago, but he had to move when that building was sold. He wasn't able to find another landlord willing to accept the voucher before the time to use it ran out.

Brown says he's been blessed with this program and calls Theus a "lifesaver." But at night, it doesn't keep his mind from racing with a thousand worries.

"I might have to lose [the boys]," he thinks. "Or, you know, we're going to be on the street. That's the main thing I think about is the street. ... I stay worried about a lot of stuff every day."

It's not clear yet whether this experiment can keep people housed long term

In just over two years, L.A.'s pilot prevention program has worked with 560 people. Data shows a large majority have stayed housed so far, but the program is conducting a more formal long term study. This is the view of downtown Los Angeles from former client Dulce Volantin's rooftop.

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In just over two years L.A.'s pilot prevention program has worked with 560 people. Data shows a large majority have stayed housed so far, but the program is conducting a more formal long term study. It includes a randomized control trial that's tracking people with similar needs who do not receive assistance.

Key questions are whether a few months of help and a few thousand dollars can make a lasting difference. And whether they are targeting the right people, meaning those who would actually end up on the streets but for this intervention.

"For example, here in Los Angeles, you might have 2 million people on public assistance, all of whom seem vulnerable. But only 1% to 2% of them will ever experience homelessness," says Janey Rountree, executive director of the California Policy Lab at UCLA, which developed the program's AI prediction tool.

Rountree expects to publish the study results in 2026, which is also when the program's funding runs out; most of its $31 million budget came from pandemic aid. She hopes there will be a strong case that it should be scaled up, and can be a model. In fact, San Diego County has already voted to create its own similar program using predictive analytics.

Depending on its long-term results, Los Angeles' proactive approach could add much needed evidence for what works to prevent homelessness, says Beth Shinn, an expert on the issue at Vanderbilt University and also an adviser to the L.A. program.

"Much of the public equates eviction prevention with homelessness prevention," she says. But while being evicted can certainly have devastating consequences, Shinn says research has not linked it to a significant rise in unsheltered homelessness. She says housing vouchers have shown the strongest success for keeping people housed, at least for families. A small-scale prevention program in New York City has also had good results.

But Shinn says the analytics driving Los Angeles' program are targeting people at much higher risk for losing housing. "You may have more failures there," she says, but the reward could also be greater. "You make the most difference for the people who are at highest risk."

An out-of-the-blue phone call that meant "the world"

Dulce Volantin (left), Valaria Zayas and their dog, Zoey in their apartment. Their building has building with on-site case management.

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When asked what this program has meant for her and her partner, Dulce Volantin chokes up as she says, "The world, the world." After months of searching with their case manager, the two women were lucky to get accepted at a subsidized apartment building with on-site case management for Volantin's mental health needs.

When they enter the door to show visitors, their little dog Zoey yaps in excitement. It's a cozy space with family photos and inspirational quotes on the walls. "Slowly but surely we started decorating the place, cause it came furnished," Volantin says.

Valaria Zayas points out photos of family in their apartment in Los Angeles.

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Valarie Zayas says the newfound stability helped her land a good job with the transit system. "I have a clear head" she says. "I don't have to worry about where our next meal is going to come from."

Across the street from their building is a park where people spend days on the green lawn and sleep in tents. Volantin says it hurts her heart to see.

"We give them whatever we have in our pockets, food, anything that we could, because we know the situation," she says. "We could have had one bad step and we would have been right there."

This story first appeared on Long Beach Post.

Long Beach will make a slew of parking tickets more expensive and charge higher cannabis taxes to avoid cutting library hours and some specialized police officers. The last-minute change, proposed hours before a City Council vote, reversed a controversial plan city leaders laid out in June to lay off nearly a dozen library employees to help balance its budget.

Facing a $58 million shortfall, the city will still lay off roughly 180 other employees and cut hundreds more vacant positions. But it will spare library staffing and hours, after the original budget — which would have cut Monday hours at five city libraries, the only ones open that day — prompted fierce public backlash.

Long Beach City Council members voted 7 to 2 on Tuesday for the revised $4-billion city budget.

Councilmember Cindy Allen, who objected, called the increased parking fines “predatory fees,” arguing that library funding shouldn’t come at the expense of unfairly targeting people already struggling financially. Allen represents a district that includes the densely populated Alamitos Beach and Rose Park neighborhoods, where parking is already scarce. “We don’t have driveways,” she said.

Kristina Duggan, who represents southeast Long Beach neighborhoods like Belmont Shore, also voted against the budget because it cut Fire Engine 14 near Colorado Lagoon, a move that’s expected to save $3.88 million but drive up response times.

Duggan and Allen both tried but failed to delay the budget vote, with Allen saying the changes were put together in a “slapdash manner” without a chance for the public to weigh in.

She warned her colleagues before the vote that if they approved the budget “without substantial discussion” then they were “complicit in rubber-stamping” a plan that would “affect people’s livelihoods.”

Under the plan, 18 categories of parking citations — including for blocking bike lanes, hydrants, double parking and crosswalks — will rise to a flat $100, up from $74 or $90, to generate $1.5 million. Street sweeping tickets would also get a $5 bump, to $80 — a difference that raises $700,000 in revenue.

In the last fiscal year, which ran Oct. 1 to Sept. 30, the city issued more than 100,000 parking citations and 201,000 street-sweeping tickets, Public Works Director Josh Hickman said. More than a fifth of street-sweeping tickets were written in Allen’s district, and more than half of all parking tickets citywide were issued in the first two council districts, which include downtown and Alamitos Beach.

John Edmond, a local lobbyist who sits on the board for the Library Foundation and spoke in support of the plan, said the $100 rates are on par with cities like San Francisco ($108), Oakland ($110), San Diego ($117). He argued this applies to the “most serious parking violations.”

“We can’t say we’re serious about pedestrian and bicycle safety without accountability,” he said.

The budget also raises the city’s cannabis retail tax from 7% to 8% and increases the cultivation tax to more than $15 per square foot, changes expected to bring in roughly $1.15 million.

The proposals came from Councilmember Joni Ricks-Oddie, who chairs the city’s Budget Oversight Committee. Ricks-Oddie said earlier Tuesday she had spent weeks preparing these and dozens of other recommendations in concert with city staff, continuously updating them to accommodate new requests that came in from the public and fellow council members.

“If we can’t do this … then we can’t fund the libraries,” Ricks-Oddie said in response to Allen’s concerns about pricier parking citations. “If we reject that, we’re saying no to our library hours on a Monday.”

The budget also sets aside $1 million for the city’s immigration legal defense fund, the Long Beach Justice Fund. That’s well short of the $2.2 million immigration attorneys and local immigrant rights groups say is needed to sustain it amid rising caseloads. Gina Amato Lough of Public Counsel’s Immigrants’ Rights Project said “the need has never been greater,” citing prolonged detentions, warrantless raids and difficulty accessing counsel.

Since Public Counsel’s $919,000, one-year contract to provide legal services began in November, the group has taken on more than 55 consultations and 46 full-scope cases through the Justice Fund.

After hearing repeated pleas for more money Tuesday, Allen proposed reallocating all the funding for Long Beach’s new Vibe City marketing campaign — which some have derided as a waste of money — to the Justice Fund. She was quickly shot down, with a representative from the City Attorney’s office saying they’re not sure that would be legal, considering the Vibe City campaign is funded by tax revenue earmarked for advertising and promoting the city.

City Council leaders called the budget cuts a necessary, if painful, step toward stabilizing Long Beach’s finances after years of instability papered over with one-time cash — a bet that higher fees now will spare deeper cuts later.

“It’s hard, and it’s personal for everyone, and it will be really difficult on families across this community,” said Councilmember Megan Kerr.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Colorful parade floats, charros on horseback and live music will take over Cesar E. Chavez Avenue on Sunday for the 80th East L.A. Mexican Independence Day Parade.

For decades, organizers have brought together community leaders, performers, businesses and organizations to celebrate culture, community and tradition. This year, the parade will culminate in a festival with family-friendly activations, including live music, local vendors and lucha libre. 

This year’s co-grand marshals are singer and actor Dasahev López Saavedra, better known as El Dasa, and Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis.

Here’s everything you need to know.

When is the parade and festival?

The parade runs from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 13. The festival takes place from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on First Street and Mednik Avenue. 

What’s the parade route? 

The 1.5-mile route will run along Cesar E. Chavez Avenue, starting at Mednik Avenue and ending on Gage Avenue. You can find a map of the parade route and other festivities on the festival’s webpage here. Early arrival is suggested to secure a viewing spot for the parade. 

A map of the East LA Mexican Independence Day Parade route.

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What streets will be closed?

• Mednik Avenue: Between 1st Street and Cesar E. Chavez from 5 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 12 to 9 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 13.
• Cesar E. Chavez Avenue: Between Vancouver Avenue and Gage Avenue from 6  a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 13.

What can I expect at the festivities?

The parade will feature floats, show cars, representatives from Eastside organizations, equestrian teams, marching bands and folklórico dancers. 

The festival will include vendors, musical performances, resource booths, a pop-up from local boutique The Goddess Mercado, a free pet vaccination clinic that will administer free vaccines for the first 200 pets, and a free lucha libre showcase by East Los Lucha. 

Where can I park? 

Limited free parking will be available at the East L.A. Civic Center lot located on E. 3rd Street and Civic Center Way. Attendees can also find street parking in the surrounding area. 

Can I take public transit to the event? 

The Metro E Line’s East L.A. Civic Center station is just a short walk from the event. 

What if I don’t want to attend in person? 

If you’re unable to attend or want to watch the parade from home, you can tune in to the live broadcast on ABC7. 

For more information, check out the website here. 

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Robbie Hall has a record of the people she has treated for overdoses at MacArthur Park.

The photos of many of the people she has treated are saved on her phone. She can scroll through them and remember each one.

Hall, an ambassador with the nonprofit Five Keys, has been doing this work for about four years and is at the park almost every day, carrying Naloxone, a medication used to reverse opioid overdoses.

She typically responds when someone stops breathing.

“I stopped counting when I got up in my 40s, because it started being gradually three of them, four of them,” Hall said. 

On a recent September morning at the park, Hall said she found a 14-year-old girl in a bathroom who was experiencing an overdose. Tears welled up as she talked about the people she encounters at the park.

“They need help, they need help,” she said. “This is every day.” 

She believes the city needs to address the problem. When asked about the plans to fence the park, she said she sees the fence as one way to improve the conditions she sees on the ground.

“They need to put something up here,” she said.

For Hall and others who work around the park, the fence is less a solution than a stopgap, something concrete to try amid problems that have proven harder to solve.

The Department of Recreation and Parks says the fence will be temporary and is still on track for construction this fall, but has not provided a specific date, cost estimate or explained what conditions would need to change before the fence comes down.

Marco Pacheco, president of the MacArthur Park Park Advisory Board, does not believe the fence will be temporary. 

“I think this is going to be permanent,” Pacheco said. “This is going to be a permanent fixture of some sort because first of all, you don’t put up a fence that costs millions of dollars to take it down. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Pacheco isn’t the only one who has doubts.

Richard Barron, who served on the Cultural Heritage Commission for 22 years before departing in July, also questioned whether the city would follow through on its promise to remove the fence.

“I doubt that the fence is going to come down,” Barron said, “especially when they’ve spent all that money. Even taking it down costs a lot of money, you know, and you’re going to throw all that material away?”

The Board of Recreation and Park Commissioners approved $2.3 million in funding for the project. The city has not said how much money will ultimately be spent on the fence.

Everyone has a different idea of what the fence will do

The city’s consultants have described a fence that would be transparent, reversible and designed to blend into the park.

Leila Hamroun, a senior preservation architect with Tetra Tech, the consulting firm working with the city on the project’s design, said the fence won’t be a dominant feature.

“The whole intent here is to guarantee that it just blends in, that it’s seamless,” Hamroun said. “It’s reversible, transparent, minimalist, consistent with the evolution of urban parks over time.”

A rendering shows the proposed green metal fence around MacArthur Park.

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The fence is expected to be about 8 feet tall, with gates at eight existing entrances. Decorative elements would be considered separately, with community input expected next year.

For Michelle Garcia, who has been a vendor around MacArthur Park since 2015, it could help distinguish vendors from the people living in the park.

“I support it if they could get the homeless people out,” Garcia said. “They are the ones that make MacArthur Park look bad. But they also make us look bad, because we sell around the area, so they think we’re like them, which we’re not.”

Garcia was among a group of vendors at MacArthur Park who held a Sept. 2 press conference to call attention to what they described as police harassment and citations that pushed vendors away from the park.

“Like us, we’re trying to work and get money for our bills, our rent,” she said.

Police have their own expectations for what a fenced park could accomplish.

The Los Angeles Police Department has stepped up enforcement around the park through a joint task force with the Drug Enforcement Administration focused on drug dealing in the area. In July, Rampart Division Capt. Benedict Fernandes said the operation had significantly disrupted the drug trade, but that drug users were spreading into surrounding neighborhoods in search of narcotics.

“We know that all the communities around have been impacted because it got spread this way, sort of like a shotgun blast,” he said. “It went south, it went east, it went north, it went west.”

Fernandes said the next phase of the enforcement effort would focus on connecting unhoused people and drug users with shelter and recovery services.

The fence, he said, is meant to make the park less convenient for drug activity and “prevent crime” inside the park.

“Because that’s the problem,” Fernandes said. “The Alvarado corridor at MacArthur Park has been convenient for drug users for years. We’re just trying to make those things stop.”

Fernandes said the temporary fence along Alvarado and now the orange bollards installed in the area, have worked to disrupt that activity. 

But Hall, the outreach worker administering Narcan at the park, has not seen those types of improvements on the ground.

“Since they did that big bust? No, it got worse,” Hall said when asked whether she had seen fewer overdoses in the area.

She said people wait for police to leave the park before returning.

“If it wasn’t for Five Keys, there would be a lot more dead bodies here,” she said.

Some residents say that adding a fence around MacArthur Park would change the makeup of the neighborhood. Others welcome a change to the troubled park.

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How the fence is supposed to work

The plan calls for the park to remain open during the day, with eight entry points, and close overnight from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. LAPD would close the gates at night, and Recreation and Parks maintenance workers would reopen them each morning.

The department says the fence is intended to make the park easier to maintain. Illegal dumping, littering, vandalism and graffiti have made routine maintenance difficult, according to the department, which has said MacArthur Park generates more graffiti cleanup requests than nearby Lafayette Park.

The city has pointed to nearby Lafayette Park, which is fenced and closed at night, as a model for MacArthur Park.

Pacheco, the president of the park’s advisory board, said he has heard general support for the fence among community members. 

“In many cases, community members alluded to Lafayette Park having been fenced for a long time, the difference between the two parks, Lafayette being a lot safer and a lot cleaner and less of a problem than MacArthur Park,” he said. 

The fence still needs final approval from the five-person commission that approved the project’s conceptual phase in October. The commission has not yet set a date to consider the final plans.

To incentivize voters to cast ballots for Republicans, President Donald Trump used his convention speech to promise a dividend of $5,000 to every adult citizen if the Republican Party maintains control of Congress in the midterm election.  

"If the Republicans win, you win with us and you get $5,000," he said. "It will be called the Trump dividend, congratulations."

The money would have to be spent in the U.S., the president said. 

Trump did not provide details about where the money would come from or the legality of his promise. According to the most recent Census data, it could cost $1 trillion or more to provide these payments. 

The event is designed to rally support for Republicans in the midterms where they face an uphill battle to maintaining control of Congress. 

He said the midterms will decide if the country stumbles or surges forward, adding that he will travel to "every race," to show his support to the Republican nominees, and to Texas even more than once. 

Trump's support and his ask of voters to "pretend" that he's on the ballot could backfire given his unpopularity amid the war in Iran and the nationwide focus on affordability.

"Vote Republican and we will leave the world in our dust for generations to come," said Trump.

Apart from the $5,000 promise, Trump's address was not very different from his typical rally speech, touching on issues he often speaks about, including tariffs, the importance of destroying Iran's nuclear program, passing a bill to limit voter identification and registration rules and claiming lower inflation than when he took office. 

It was a night where Trump was the star of the show. The event, billed as a "Trumpapalooza," put the president center stage as Republican candidates, lawmakers and everyday Americans shared appreciation for Trump and his policies.

President Trump greets attendees as he walks on stage to speak on the first day of the 2026 Republican National Convention Sept. 9, 2026 in Dallas, Texas.

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"Let's hear it for the man who had the vision to hold this convention," Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., said to widespread applause.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Republican Senate nominee in Texas, also opened by praising President Trump for standing up for Texas.

Paxton addressed the economy, promising tax relief policies to help American families. He also made an appeal for more support, acknowledging that his opponent, state Rep. James Talarico has the money advantage.

"I need your prayers, your vote and your support," Paxton said. "If we lose Texas, we lose the common sense revolution. If we lose the common sense revolution, we lose America."

Texas Republican Senate candidate, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton walks on stage on the first day of the 2026 Republican National Convention on Sept. 9, 2026 in Dallas, Texas.

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Rep. Brandon Gill, who represents a district north of Dallas, said this election is about "the mainstream versus the extreme."

Gill, one of the speakers with the longest address Wednesday, returned several times to transgender issues, a culture-war theme that has been especially prominent in Texas politics.

"I think we can all remember the good old days when political debates were about marginal tax rates and government spending," Gill quipped. "Now we are debating whether toddlers can become transgender, whether men can become pregnant and whether your daughter should have to share a locker room with a man."

Attorney General Todd Blanche spoke about the Trump administration's law enforcement agenda.

"President Trump will hold you accountable," he said. "If you choose violence, you will be held accountable. Now that is making America safe again."

Before Blanche, no sitting Attorney General had spoken at a political party convention, the House Judiciary Dems said on X Tuesday.

They called Blanche's participation in the convention "dumbfounding and unprecedented. Amazing how far the DOJ has fallen," said the post. 

Political parties typically hold big, televised presidential nominating conventions every four years, but this isn't a presidential election year. And midterm conventions just aren't a thing (at least not since Democrats scrapped them after a short run in 1982).

It would be reasonable to ask why Republicans, trying to hang onto their narrow majorities in the House and the Senate, would want to train so much attention on a president whose approval rating is underwater.

People hold signs on the first day of the 2026 Republican National Convention Sept. 9 in Dallas, Texas. President Donald Trump will headline the Republican National Committee's first-ever midterm convention Wednesday night.

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At a recent campaign rally, Trump laid out the theory of the case.

"The problem that we have is they say that Trump does great when he's on the ballot," said Trump, speaking in the third person. "But when he's not on the ballot, his people don't come and they don't vote.

"So, what I really want you to do is pretend please, that I am on the ballot," Trump said at the rally for South Carolina Republican Sen. Darline Graham, who is running for her seat this fall. "Just come and vote. It's so important."

But this isn't just a plea for Republican primary voters in a runoff election in a deep red state. In swing states and toss up districts, Trump and his advisors are trying to rebuild the coalition of voters who propelled him back into office in 2024, voters who don't always show up if there isn't a presidential race at the top of the ticket.

This is a different approach than that taken by most presidents whose parties are facing political headwinds in a midterm year. But President Trump has never been one to go along with the normal rules of politics.

Convention organizers say the gathering in Dallas will focus on the issues shaping the midterms, including lowering the cost of living and raising incomes, securing the border and protecting American values.

Based on an NPR analysis, using race ratings from the Cook Political Report, fewer than half of the Republican candidates in competitive House and Senate races are listed as convention speakers.

"We're going to be back in our district, working hard," said Republican Rep. Zach Nunn of Iowa, when quizzed on his convention plans by reporters on Capitol Hill.

He's in a toss-up race for reelection.

But if the White House is concerned about attendance, Vance isn't letting on.

"The president and I can go and make [the] argument on national TV," Vance said at a White House press briefing last week. "We don't need a congressman in a tight race to be there in all cases."

There's also a question of who will be watching. The convention is up against the NFL season opener on Wednesday night, a rematch of this year's Super Bowl between the Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots. There's a primetime football game on Thursday night as well.

Democrats aren't planning their own convention and the counterprogramming will be fairly limited.

"Most elected officials don't even want to go to [presidential nominating conventions]," said John Anzalone, a Democratic pollster and consultant. "I mean, the expiration date on conventions has passed a long, long time ago."

And, he argues, the war in Iran, unpopular tariffs, high gas prices and broader affordability concerns, mean the political environment "is disastrous for Republicans running for office and this Republican convention is not going to change that narrative one iota for the midterm elections."

Ohio Republican Party chairman Alex Triantafilou said he had no trouble finding people interested in attending. But the state party was also allotted far fewer tickets than it would get for a traditional presidential convention.

"From the very beginning we were told that we could use this as an opportunity to rally the troops and to raise some money for the party and those two things have certainly happened," said Triantafilou.

He said the state party is using the convention to excite grassroots Republicans and he hopes the president will visit Ohio again sometime before the November election.

"He is very popular here," said Triantafilou. "We do talk a lot about low propensity voters and turning them out. Nobody turns out low propensity voters in Ohio like the president. So, we welcome this."

Whether this novel midterms approach will pay off is yet to be seen, but some Republicans say it may be the best shot the party has to limit its losses in what is widely expected to be a tough year for Republicans.

"Running to President Trump and defending his record, I think, is an interesting strategy and I think it is so interesting that it might just work," said Terry Schilling, president of the American Principles Project, a Republican group. "We've tried running away from the president in previous midterms and we almost always lose."

Schilling will be at the convention and says he expects many of his friends involved in Republican politics to be there as well. He hopes they emerge energized and ready to drive a focused message heading into the midterms.

NPR's Eric McDaniel contributed reporting for this story.
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