The Republican National Committee has narrowed its list of contenders to host its 2024 presidential nominating convention to four cities, a party official confirmed to CBS News.
Politico was first to report the shortlist of convention sites. The cities in contention are Milwaukee, Nashville, Pittsburgh and Salt Lake City. Party leaders plan to travel to these cities in the coming weeks to meet with local officials before making a decision.
RNC leaders will meet in Salt Lake City next month to discuss the 2024 election cycle, including the primary calendar, convention sites and debate logistics.
The search committee for the next Republican nominating convention was formed at the party’s summer meeting in Nashville. Officials from several other cities met with RNC leaders last year to make their pitch to host the convention.
“The Republican National Committee is grateful for and appreciative of the overwhelming interest from cities across the country to host the 2024 Republican National Convention,” RNC chief of staff Richard Walters said in a statement. “We’ll continue the process, review bids, and communicate with potential hosts to hear more about what their cities have to offer.”
Republicans and Democrats both scrapped their plans for party conventions in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Democrats were supposed to hold their convention in Milwaukee, which is one of the cities Republicans are considering in two years. That would bring Republicans to a state that former President Donald Trump lost in 2020, after winning it narrowly in 2016. Hosting the convention in Pittsburgh would also bring Republicans to a state that Democrats flipped in the 2020 presidential election.
Selecting Salt Lake City or Nashville as the host site would bring Republicans to solidly red states, rather than the battleground states that typically host conventions.
RNC staff will travel to the four cities to determine if the locations are viable for hosting a convention by examining facilities, hotels and security operations. From there, the list will be narrowed to three finalists and the Site Selection Committee will visit those cities to meet with potential host officials.
Two of the cities on the RNC’s shortlist are also reportedly pursuing bids to host the Democratic National Convention. The Tennessean reported in late December that Nashville would make a pitch to host the Democrats. Former Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, who recently left the job to serve as President Joe Biden’s Ambassador to Luxembourg, wrote a letter to the DNC last year expressing Milwaukee’s interest in hosting Democrats for their 2024 convention.
The Democratic National Committee kicked off its 2024 convention search process last summer and is still reviewing bids.
