I soldiered through the red meat of Mike Pence’s convention address – noting the omissions (180,000 pandemic dead) and the lies (“we’re re-opening America’s schools,” many of which, in truth, are closing or in chaos) – and alas, I waited in vain for even a passing reference to Kyle Rittenhouse.

If you know the name, rest assured you never heard it mentioned last night at the Republican convention. The speakers were not about to deviate from their mission: to stoke more White fear of Black people for the purpose of boosting Trump’s re-election prospects.

Mentioning Rittenhouse – an Illinois teenage Trump fanboy who crossed state lines toting an AR-15 to supposedly enforce law and order in Kenosha, Wisconsin; who’s now charged with murdering two people on the street – would definitely have messed with the GOP’s convention message and political strategy. Best to pretend that militia wannabee Rittenhouse, and white domestic terrorists just like him, simply don’t exist.

By the way, dare we even wonder how some 17-year-old kid gets himself locked and loaded with an AR-15? David Frum, the ex-George W. Bush speechwriter, laments that “millions of Americans are complicit in the (gun) policies that such a weapon in such hands and left two families so preventably bereaved.”

But I digressed. Kids like Rittenhouse are mere putty in the hands of cynical enablers – starting, of course, with Trump. Last January, Rittenhouse popped up in the front row of a Trump rally – he recorded his presence in a Tik Tok video that’s now been deleted – and he surely heard der leader’s demagogic dog whistle (“Democrats stand for crime, corruption, and chaos. Republicans stand for law, order, and justice”). Obviously we can’t tie this kid’s alleged homicides directly to Trump’s rhetoric, but we can say with confidence that do-it-yourself domestic terrorists like Rittenhouse take to the streets inspired by what they perceive to be Trump’s priorities. As Rittenhouse wrote in his Tik Tok bio, “Trump 2020,” with two American flags.

Even though the kid rated nary a mention at the convention, a Trump spokesman felt compelled to say that Rittenhouse “had nothing to do with our campaign,” which was no surprise, because that’s how they play the game. Trump puts out The Word, but as soon as people act on what they’ve heard, Trump’s minions distance him from the deadly results – as happened last summer, for instance, after the white El Paso shooter who killed 21 was found to have echoed Trump’s rhetoric about an immigrant “invasion.”

Last night, it was Pence’s mission to remain oblivious. He denounced “violence and chaos…looting and rioting…the violence must stop,” without once mentioning that the Black rage in Kenosha was sparked by the police shooting an unarmed Black man seven times in the back, as three of his kids watched. The police triggered the unrest, the unrest brought Rittenhouse out of the woodwork…it doesn’t take a stable genius to connect those dots. But for a loyal MAGA cultist like Pence, that’s inconvenient.

And why would Trump and Pence mention Rittenhouse when their enablers in the right-wing echo chamber are doing the job for them? The instant message is that the kid charged with two counts of first-degree intentional homicide is actually a hero. Ann Coulter tweeted last night: “I want him as my president.” On Fox News, Tucker Carlson said: “How shocked are we that 17-year-olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would?”

Maintain order…That’s rich. One of Rittenhouse’s alleged homicide victims was a young guy armed with a skateboard.

We can only speculate on whether police violence, or the resultant unrest, or the backlash to the unrest, will ultimately have the most sway over the November electorate. But I wouldn’t underestimate the potential power of Trump’s Be Very Afraid message. Scaring White folks has worked for Republicans in the past (1968, 1988) and it could resonate again – especially among the sizeable pool of non-college Whites who skipped the ’16 election.

The Trump GOP murders the truth every day, but it knows how to stoke the ugly emotions. Joe Biden had better be ready to play hardball.