Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the St. Louis couple facing felony charges for pointing their firearms at protesters after they damaged a gate and entered the couple’s private community back in June, will be featured at next week’s Republican National Convention, according to sources who broke the news during the first evening of the Democratic National Convention.

The news helped to distract from the first night of the DNC, which wasn’t hard, frankly. The evening featured a lot of pre-taped speeches, blamecasting from New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, and whatever the hell this was supposed to be.

The moment Trump won re-election pic.twitter.com/nEuUp8F0zp

— Secular Talk (@KyleKulinski) August 18, 2020

I’m not sure when an RNC last featured someone facing felony charges, but then again, that’s part of the draw for Republicans and the Trump campaign in highlighting the couple. The message sent by the McCloskeys’ appearance is simple: Democrats want to ban your guns and prevent you from defending yourself and your family, and they’ll try to destroy you for exercising your Second Amendment rights.

In fact, it looks like the RNC will feature several individuals who’ve been the targets of cancellation by the Left. In addition to the McCloskeys, Covington Catholic student Nick Sandmann, who recently settled a multi-million dollar defamation lawsuit filed against CNN, will also be speaking, according to Republican officials.

The McCloskeys aren’t exactly the perfect surrogates for the Second Amendment, but given the high profile of their case and the natural tie-in to Donald Trump’s “law-and-order” campaign, it makes sense that they would be featured as an example of what can happen to average people who try to exercise their right to keep and bear arms when Democrats are in charge. The McCloskeys believed they were protecting their home from threats, and in return St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner decided to make an example out of them.

Ordinarily, it might not be the best idea for a criminal defendant to take a high-profile speaking gig at the RNC while their case is still ongoing, but this isn’t exactly an ordinary prosecution. Gardner’s already offered to allow the McCloskeys to enter into a diversion program that would keep them out of prison, but Missouri Gov. Brad Parson has also already said he’ll pardon the couple if they’re convicted, and the state’s attorney general has filed a motion to intervene in the case in order to drop the charges completely.

In other words, the case is already a political circus. The couple appearing center stage at the RNC will most likely enrage the Left, but it’s not going hurt the McCloskeys’ chances in a court of law, and will hopefully serve as a reminder that if Joe Biden and Kamala Harris end up in the White House, the attacks on the McCloskeys will be just a preview of the broader war on legal gun owners that Democrats are planning to wage in 2021.