So the Republican National Convention got underway yesterday, capped by a cameo appearance by Donald Trump, with bandaged ear. The biggest news from the convention was the announcement that Senator J.D. Vance would be Trump's running mate, but Trump's surprise appearance was definitely the most memorable moment of the night. The other big surprise last night was hearing from a Union boss (Teamsters), which is not exactly a usual thing at a Republican convention (to put it mildly). Is Trump (and now Vance) truly shifting the Republican Party to a more populist outlook, or was it more of a "let's make the Democrats scared" type of stunt? It's impossible to say, really. The Union boss did get the key speaking slot (he was the last big speech of the night) and was allowed to speak for at least 15 minutes (which is a long speech for a convention). The applause was pretty tepid, though, as plenty of GOP delegates are not exactly friendly to Unions in general.

But instead of a play-by-play of yesterday's convention I am going to write primarily about Democrats today. Because there was big news from the other side of the aisle as well.

President Joe Biden gave another roughly 20-minute interview last night, this time to NBC's Lester Holt. Obviously, the attempted assassination of Donald Trump was a big subject, and Biden repeated his absolute and unequivocal condemnation of political violence in any form -- as he always has done. But Biden was fairly defiant during the whole interview, including a refusal to stop pointing out to voters that Donald Trump is a threat to American democracy. The calls for unity and dialing down the rhetoric are only going to go so far, and they will likely not last all that long either (from both what Biden said and what Republicans were saying at their convention).

Biden was also adamant about staying in the race once again. After Trump's assassination attempt, the Democratic movement to try to convince Biden to step down has either (depending on which rumors you believe) gone completely dormant (no Democratic officeholder has added their name to the list of those calling on Biden to end his re-election run since Saturday), or at the very least these efforts have gone underground for now and are happening behind the scenes rather than in public.

As in his first post-debate primetime interview, Biden seems to be living in a bubble of advisors who are not painting the full picture of where the race stands to him. Biden said he was "up four points" in multiple polls recently, which simply isn't true (the best he's done is a poll which showed him beating Trump nationally by two points, but most of the polling shows him down -- especially in the crucial battleground states). Biden also continues to question any poll's accuracy, which could be a worrisome sign of denial. To be fair though, Biden hasn't completely tanked in the polls. Both sides seem pretty locked in -- both Biden and Trump voters have already accepted their candidates' drawbacks, so little if anything is going to change most people's minds at this point, it seems.

Something going on largely behind the scenes is that the Democratic National Committee is still moving forward with holding an early nomination vote. There was a logistical problem with holding the Democratic National Convention so late in the year, because some states required the party to have its nominee in place by their filing date for the general election -- which fell before the convention was to be held. Most states just passed an exemption for the Democrats, which apparently is pretty standard. But Ohio was the last state to do so, and the way it did so still might leave the door open to legal challenges to Joe Biden being included on the Ohio presidential ballots. So the Democratic Party decided to fix the problem proactively.

They came up with the idea of holding a virtual roll call of the state delegates weeks before the convention. That way, by party rules, they would already have officially decided on their nominee. The convention itself would not be where this happened, it would already be a done deal, and the convention would just be a symbolic renomination -- kind of like a couple eloping and then later holding a formal wedding ceremony for friends and family to celebrate their marriage.

This was all pretty non-contentious, right up until the first debate. But now, with the movement to replace Biden, it has become a lot more important. The Democratic National Committee is moving ahead with the plans to hold the early virtual roll call, ostensibly so there will be no possible legal challenges in Ohio. The delegate voting could begin as soon as next Monday. This, obviously, complicates the issue by shrinking the window when Biden could easily drop out of the race. Which is exactly what Biden wants right now, since he is so adamant that he's going to continue running. If Biden is officially nominated next week it may not completely end the movement to replace him at the top of the ticket, but it will complicate things.

The other big news on the Democratic side of the aisle is that Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey was just found guilty on all counts in his corruption trial. The jury didn't buy his argument that all those gold bars and loose cash lying around the senator's home were all just the result of friendly gifts.

Here's the story, from the Washington Post today:

Sen. Bob Menendez was convicted Tuesday of taking bribes from three businessmen who showered him and his wife with cash, gold bars and a Mercedes-Benz, an extravagant bounty for his help securing deals with foreign officials and trying to derail several criminal investigations in New Jersey.

The jury in Manhattan federal court found the once powerful New Jersey lawmaker guilty on all 16 felony counts. They include bribery, extortion, wire fraud, conspiracy, obstruction of justice and acting as a foreign agent for Egypt from 2018 to 2022, when Menendez was at the height of his influence in Washington, serving as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee or as the panel's top Democrat while his party was in the minority.

The two co-defendants in the trial, real estate developer Fred Daibes and businessman Wael "Will" Hana, were also convicted.

Menendez showed no emotion as the guilty verdicts were read about 1 p.m., after three days of jury deliberations. U.S. District Judge Sidney H. Stein scheduled sentencing for Oct. 29; the punishment could be decades in prison and a ban from holding public office.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the governor of New Jersey have already called for Menendez to resign his Senate seat, now that he is a convicted felon. Menendez is vowing to appeal and so far has not stepped down. His appeal isn't a lost cause -- the federal courts (including the Supreme Court) have been gutting the bribery and corruption laws for politicians for a while now, to the point where it has gotten very hard to prove such things in court. So Menendez may eventually get the conviction overturned, but up until that point he will still be a sitting senator who is also a convicted felon.

To state the painfully obvious, this is not exactly a good look for the Democratic Party right now. After all, part of their case against Donald Trump is that he is now a convicted felon. To allow a similarly-convicted felon to continue to serve in the United States Senate drastically undercuts that argument.

Menendez is at the end of his political career either way. He is technically running to get re-elected to his seat, but as an independent. This is likely so he can raise money for his legal defense team -- the polls show he has no chance of winning and the Democrats have already nominated someone else for the race. So even the best-case scenario for Menendez is likely that he'll get to serve until the end of this calendar year and then be forced into retirement anyway.

There are plenty of Democrats calling for Menendez to do the right thing and step down, so the governor can name a replacement for his seat for the remainder of his term. We're going to end today by adding our voice to the rest of them -- Senator Menendez, it is time to go. Resign, for the sake of your party.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant