thank you, joe watkins and ayesha moody. >>> coming up, the gop goes postal. i'll explain next. >>> first, my colleague richard lui with today's other top news stories. >> all right, thanks, rev. the stories we're watching this hour for you, more than 170,000, that's a total number of covid-related deaths nationwide. in the latest count by nbc news, the number of cases nationwide now topping 5.3 million. >>> now, more students are heading back to class this week. but not one arizona school district. more than 100 staff members there are refusing to show up at a school district outside phoenix indicating here they did not feel safe returning to the classroom with students. >>> and the food and drug at station granted emergency authorization for new saliva-based tests for the virus. this comes as the federal government pushes to expand testing capacity. developers at yale are calling it liess invasive and less expensive. more news later. "politicsnation" with reverend al sharpton returns right after the break. looks like they picked the wrong getaway driver. the

i'm joined by joe watkins, a republican strategist and former white house aide to george h.w. bush. d to see you. thanks for joining us. >> good to see you also. >> the rnc made an attempt to appeal to black voters on more than one night of the convention. let's take a look back. >> mr. vice president, look at me. i am black. we are not all the same, sir. i am not in chains. my mind is my own. >> democratic party does not want black people to leave their mental plantation. >> abandoned buildings, liquor stores on every corner. we want safety in our neighborhoods. >> it hurt my soul to hear the terrible names people call donald. the worst is racist. in the deep south, i have seen racism up close. i know what it is, and it isn't donald trump. >> now, we know that black voters are certainly not a monolith. we also know, i believe the number is around 13% of black men who voted for trump in 2016. during a time right now when social injustice is so front and center, is the president doing enough? >> i think certainly more could be done, and it would be great to see republicans and democra

republican strategist joe watkins is with us now from philadelphia former white house aide actually to president george h. w. bush nice to have you with us what just said there isn't that what the president should be say. well i think that the milan the trump took advantage of the state of course these protests have been happening in just in the last couple of days at some point that shooting took place and malani that from took advantage of the fact that she was the keynote speaker at the convention and that she had a massive american audience listening and she took time to say what needed to be said about the need. for americans to to love each other. and not consider the color of a person's skin but to love each other because we're all human beings with respect to that doesn't answer the question isn't that the type of thing the president should be saying the president's going to appear every night at this national convention not just on his acceptance night do you think he should be addressing it directly. i think that the american public would expect the president to address this