Republicans move forward with plans for a midterm convention featuring Trump

By Jeff Zeleny, Arlette Saenz, CNN

(CNN) — The Republican National Committee voted Friday to move forward with holding a midterm political convention, an unusual GOP festival that President Donald Trump would headline in hopes of rallying supporters to focus on the critical fall fight for control of Congress.

To fulfill Trump’s wish of staging a political convention later this year, Republican leaders had to change party rules that previously only called for a convention during presidential election years. They did so by unanimously passing a resolution Friday during the party’s winter meeting in Santa Barbara, California, an RNC official said.

A memo obtained by CNN said the rule change allows for the “possibility of an America First midterm convention-style gathering aligned with President Trump’s vision for energizing the party this fall.”

For months, the president has been signaling his interest in holding a 2026 political convention, saying last year the event would “show the great things we have done since the Presidential Election of 2024.”

The new rule requires the convention be called at least 60 days in advance. The White House will determine the date and location in the coming weeks, GOP officials said, with Las Vegas among the cities under serious consideration.

The decision to hold the first GOP political convention during a non-presidential election year underscores the degree to which Republicans are placing Trump at the center of the party’s strategy and attempting to nationalize midterm races.

The stakes are remarkably high for Trump. In his first term, Republicans lost control of the House after the 2018 midterms, allowing the Democratic-run House to open impeachment proceedings the following year and probes of his finances, his businesses and the operations of the White House.

“You gotta win the midterms,” Trump said, speaking at a retreat for Republican lawmakers earlier this month in Washington. “If we don’t win the midterms, it’s just going to be be – I mean, they’ll find a reason to impeach me.”

Democrats are counting on Trump to motivate their voters too. They hold a 5-point advantage in the generic congressional ballot, the same edge they had in polling at a similar point in 2018. And Trump has lost significant standing since his second inauguration with independent voters and key voting blocs, with a recent CNN poll finding a majority of Americans consider his first year in office to have been a failure.

Democrats also have floated holding a midterm convention but a final decision has not been made. They last held a midterm convention more than four decades ago.

GOP officials acknowledge the potential risks of putting Trump at the center of their midterm election fight. But they say their best chances in November rely upon Trump motivating his base, particularly those who may not otherwise vote in the 2026 contests.

Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff, is a leading proponent of that argument.

“Typically in the midterms it’s not about who’s sitting at the White House. You localize the election, and you keep the federal officials out of it,” Wiles said in an interview last year with “The Mom View,” a conservative program. “We’re actually going to turn that on its head and put him on the ballot because so many of those low propensity voters are Trump voters.”

This story has been updated with additional details.

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