America has never felt more divided or dangerous says Caroline Graham

Living in Los Angeles for nearly 30 years, I’ve got used to strange bumps in the night.

They usually mean a seismic rumbling from the San Andreas Fault, something all Californians learn to live with.

But last week it was different, because the dull thuds above my head were the sound of two intruders making their way across the roof of my bungalow before clambering down to a waiting car.

It’s never happened before and I hope it’s not repeated. But for the first time in three decades I’ve installed security cameras.

Something has changed in America and for the worse. My brush with fear was mercifully brief. No one was hurt.

But the mood of conflict is spreading way beyond the televised scenes of violence in Portland or Wisconsin and day by day it feels more personal.

Even for me, after years of covering the news, it’s been hard to believe – just as hard as it’s been to take my eyes away from the surreal events unfolding on screen.

For weeks now, the nightly news has been filled with riot police and – increasingly – gun-toting ‘militia’ members facing off against protesters in cities right across the biggest democracy in the Western world.

What is any normal person to make of the 17-year-old vigilante who, armed with a semi-automatic rifle, allegedly shot and killed two men during protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin?

These protests in turn had been provoked by an act of inexplicable violence when yet another unarmed black man, Jacob Blake, was shot and paralysed by the police in front of his three children.

There were bizarre scenes outside a restaurant in Washington DC when a baying mob was filmed yelling and screaming at diner Lauren Victor simply because she refused to raise her fist in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.

It’s a particular irony that Victor, a 49-year-old urban planner, is a staunch supporter of the BLM movement. But she felt ‘under attack’, and no wonder, explaining: ‘I’ve been marching with them for weeks and weeks and weeks.

‘It just felt overwhelming to have all those people come at you. To have a crowd… demand that you do this thing. In the moment, it didn’t feel right.’

With just 64 days until November’s presidential election, this country has never felt more divided – or dangerous.

Over the years, I have witnessed some terrible things. Too many school shootings to count.

The sight of tiny shoes and teddy bears under a Christmas tree after the Sandy Hook massacre in 2012 left 20 primary school children dead led to anti-gun demonstrations across the nation.

I was the first reporter inside the Superdome after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans in 2005 and heard the anguished cries of those who had been left to die.

There have been plane crashes, tornadoes, bombings in Oklahoma and at the Atlanta Olympics and, of course, 9/11.

But after all those events, America came together and rose again in that ‘only in America’ defiant way which epitomises the courage, resilience and optimism of this nation.

But this feels different. When riots erupted after George Floyd’s killing, my city was set on fire.

I could see shops aflame on Melrose Avenue from inside my living room as, night after night, police helicopters circled low overhead looking for looters.

It got so bad, a group of neighbours drew up a plan to barricade the end of our street with cars to prevent rioters coming up the hill.

I still love this country, enough to become an American citizen ten years ago. But there has been a seismic shift.

Americans no longer feel optimistic or hopeful. The American Dream has died. I’m not alone in feeling this way.

Friends of mine are fleeing big cities like LA and New York, heading for the apparent safety of rural areas like Montana and the hills of South Dakota.

One girlfriend had her gold chain ripped from her neck as she jogged through the once-safe streets of Santa Monica. She has since built a £10,000 ‘panic room’ in her house.

My own night-time encounter was enough to prompt me to spend £3,500 on a ‘ring of steel’ security system, including night-vision cameras and a monthly fee for an ‘armed response’ if the alarm goes off

 The woman who sold it to me confessed: ‘Business is booming.’ Meanwhile, gun dealers coast-to-coast have reported a dramatic spike in sales as people seek to protect themselves and embrace their Second Amendment right to bear arms.

And all of it, of course, could be great news for President Trump.

As he formally accepted the Republican nomination in the grounds of the White House on Thursday night, Trump, a former TV reality star used to framing his political ideologies in snappy slogans (‘Make America Great Again’), made it clear law and order – far more than Covid-19, jobs, healthcare or the economy – is at the heart of his re-election campaign.

Denouncing Democratic rival Joe Biden as a member of the ‘radical Left who will defund police departments all across America’, Trump said: ‘No one will be safe in Biden’s America. There is violence and danger in the streets of Democratic-run cities throughout America.

‘Your vote will decide whether we protect law-abiding Americans or whether we give free rein to violent anarchists, agitators and criminals.’

Trump’s victory in the 2016 election was largely down to appealing to white, working class American men by promising to bring back blue collar jobs lost to countries like China and Mexico.

This time around, he is targeting – brazenly – increasingly fearful women like me.

Night after night during this week’s Republican Convention, the President trotted out immaculately-coiffed women – dubbed ‘Trumpettes’ – from all backgrounds to hammer home his message that fear and anarchy will stalk the streets unless he is elected for a second term.

There were nurses, teachers, his own daughters Tiffany and Ivanka, and a heart-breaking procession of victims of violence.

Widow Ann Dorn told how her policeman husband was shot dead by looters during a night of rioting following the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May.

A tearful Mrs Dorn wept as she told how her husband David, who was black, had his murder live-streamed on Facebook.

‘How did we get to this point where so many young people are so callous and indifferent towards human life?’ she said.

‘This isn’t a video game where you can commit mayhem and then hit reset and bring all the characters back to life. David is never coming back.’

Cissie Graham, the granddaughter of evangelist Billy Graham – a powerful figure in Right-wing Christian America – was equally adamant Trump was the only one who would protect ‘faith and family’.

Patricia McCloskey, a lawyer from St Louis who was photographed beside her husband waving guns at protesters who walked through their gated community, said: ‘It seems as if the Democrats no longer view the Government’s job as protecting honest citizens from criminals but rather protecting criminals from honest citizens.

‘They want to abolish the suburbs altogether by ending single-family home zoning – bringing crime, lawlessness and low-quality apartments into thriving suburban neighbourhoods.’

Democrat voters already understand how widely these feelings are shared – particularly among the swing voters.

One of my friends, a staunch Democrat who hosted Hollywood fundraisers for Trump’s opponent Hillary Clinton last time around, fears the Trumpettes could be as effective as the ‘Make America Great’ slogan and ‘crooked Hillary’ barbs were during the last election.

Then, as now, the Democrats led at the polls for months – but were forced to watch Trump sail into the White House.

‘By rolling out all these attractive women – nurses, teachers, mothers, housewives – and having them speak to the fear of violence and anarchy on the streets if the Democrats win could really resonate with undecided female voters who may well decide this election,’ she told me.

‘It’s a clever tactic on Trump’s part. The irony is his policies have caused many of the social injustice problems America faces today. But the protests and riots are good for Trump because he can point to cities like LA and New York which are Democrat-controlled and argue years of Democratic leadership has led to chaos on the streets.

‘And of course his message appeals to his base of white conservative Christians who love talk of God and guns.’

In Texas last week, rival groups attacked each other with makeshift weapons including American flags with the poles still attached.

More than 68 people were arrested during protests in Louisville, Kentucky, on Tuesday. Protesters have been shot, some fatally, in Austin, Portland, Albuquerque and Dallas.

In Dallas, a shop owner was beaten so brutally as he tried to defend his store, he has been left with permanent brain damage.

And the stress of the pandemic, combined with an acrimonious presidential election, is only likely to escalate the violence further.

Lance Arnold, the police chief in Weatherford, Texas, where clashes erupted between far-Right militia and demonstrators seeking to tear down a Confederate statue, said: ‘It seems like we as a country have moved right past the discussion phase of things and now we are at the stage of conflict, being at odds, distrust and disbelief. This is not who we, as Americans, are.’

Social media has poured fuel on the flames of discord. The 17-year-old vigilante who is alleged to have shot two men in Wisconsin was a member of an online police-support group called Blue Lives Matter.

A new protest group called Take America Back Texas has seen membership soar to 10,000 in two months. One of its members is Wendi Rees, a suburban mother from Tyler, Texas, who said: ‘Our constitutional rights are being threatened.

‘So people like me, we have had enough and we are not going to sit back and let it happen any more.’

Members are encouraged to show up at protests wearing patriotic red, white and blue clothing and wrap orange tape around their arms ‘to make it easier for the police to identify us as patriots’.

The Trump camp has admitted the chaos is in its favour.

Trump’s retiring special adviser and proud Trumpette Kellyanne Conway said: ‘The more chaos and anarchy and vandalism and violence reigns, the better it is for the very clear choice on who’s best on public safety and law and order.’

But the President’s political rival has accused him of ‘rooting for violence’ to win votes.

Biden, whose Democratic National Convention two weeks ago attracted an illustrious cast of speakers including former President Barack Obama and wife Michelle, claims Trump is trying to deflect attention away from his ‘appalling’ handling of the Covid-19 crisis which has already cost 180,000 American lives.

Biden has cast the election as a choice between his promise of calm, experienced leadership and Trump’s desire to inflame an America already on the brink.

Biden’s running mate, Senator Kamala Harris, who could be the first black woman Vice-President, argued peaceful protesters should not be confused ‘with those looting and committing acts of violence’.

‘We will not let these vigilantes and extremists derail the path to justice,’ the former federal prosecutor said. But they could yet derail the Democratic hopeful.

While polls put Biden ahead of Trump by as much as 15 per cent earlier this year, the violence appears to be working in the President’s favour – as do falling rates of coronavirus infection and deaths.

The gap has now dropped to 7.1 per cent in an average of national polls, down from 7.6 per cent last week. On Wednesday, a CNBC/Change Research poll of voters in six crucial swing states found Trump’s approval rating has gone up to 48 per cent.

Pollster Frank Luntz studied at Oxford University and is a close friend of Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

He helped Johnson get elected as President of the Oxford Union debating society and worked in every UK Election from 1997-2015, and is today considered one of the most accurate political pollsters in the world.

Luntz says the election is too close to call, but warned Trump’s speech this week introduced ‘new and effective angles of attack’.

‘He [Trump] spoke about anarchy and anarchism versus socialism and that’s the first time I’ve heard him try to define Biden with a word and language that different,’ he said. ‘His best line was, “How can the Democratic party lead our country when they spend so much time tearing down our country?”

‘I say this emphatically, this election is way too close to call. The debates are going to matter.’

Trump and Biden are set to debate three times – at the end of September and twice in October.

Like most Americans, I will be glued to my TV set, as I was when Trump debated Hillary Clinton in 2016. This time, though, my house will be surrounded by security cameras – a big ‘Armed Response’ sign by the front door.