Raised Fists, a Missed Kiss and Other Images from the Republican Convention

Republicans entered the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee this week promising a new message of reconciliation and national unity after the recent attempt on former President Donald Trump’s life. Instead, the convention-goers embraced — quite literally — a different symbolic message: The raised fist, echoing Trump’s post-assassination attempt pose and transforming it into a visual shorthand for Trump’s latest message. “Fight, fight, fight.”

The symbol — held aloft on the floor — immediately stood out to David Hume Kennerly, the Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer who was shooting the convention for POLITICO Magazine.

“The raised fist was the overriding visual theme of the event,” said Kennerly, who has photographed over a dozen national political conventions since 1976. “It was the raised fist, God and ‘divine intervention’ — almost everybody talked about it.”

On the whole, said Kennerly, the convention was a relatively low-drama affair. Even the most suspenseful moment — Trump’s announcement of Ohio Sen. JD Vance as his running mate — ended up being a bit anticlimactic, with the news leaking on social media before it officially reached the convention floor.

Instead, Republicans — with their fists raised — rallied behind Trump. By the close of the convention on Thursday, Kennerly said, a type of unity was in the air.

“Unity, but not for anybody other than them.”