AnalysisAfter a police shooting of black man Jacob Blake, Kenosha's locals are trying to pick up the pieces
The streets of Kenosha have returned to an eerie calm, a battered and bruised city trying to get back on its feet.
But the destruction fuelled by the hurt and anger of the past week remains raw.
The city is littered with smouldering ruins. Most of the buildings that remain have been boarded up as this community on edge braces for more trouble.
Armed citizens have travelled to Kenosha, Wisconsin, acting as a militia during protests prompted by the shooting of black man Jacob Blake by police.
Mr Blake was paralysed after being shot several times by a police officer outside his car.
Amid the demonstrations over the shooting, property has been destroyed, prompting some citizens to take to the streets armed with rifles and other guns.
Scott Carpenter, whose family business of 42 years was burnt to the ground two nights ago, watched with his family via an online video stream as it went up in flames.
"There was nothing we could do. It was very sad. It was hurtful. Very heart wrenching", he said.
His parents started the business in their garage before eventually taking up residence on one of Kenosha's main drags.
They, like many others, have become the collateral damage to a culture war racking America's streets.
"I don't know why we were a target. And I know it was just opportunists. It wasn't right," he said.
"I'm not going to hold anger or animosity towards any specific group, because I don't believe that group really had a lot to do [with] it.
"This was just evil hearted people wanting to destroy whatever they could."
It was only months ago that massive protests were sparked after the death of George Floyd at the hands of a white police man.
Now investigators are looking into another police shooting of a black man.
"So many people have reached out to me saying they're sorry that this has been happening to my family," Mr Blake's sister Letetra Widman said on Tuesday (local time).
"Well don't be sorry because this has been happening to my family for a long time, longer than I can account for.
"It happened to Emmett Till, Emmett Till is my family. It happened to Philando, Mike Brown, Sandra.
"I don't want your pity, I want change."
The white police officer, who fired seven rounds towards Mr Blake, hitting him four times, has been identified as Rusten Sheskey.
Authorities also revealed they found a knife in the footwell of Mr Blake's car.
The announcement came after two protesters were shot dead. The arrest of an alleged 17-year-old gunman, who didn't live in the area but came from a town about half an hour's drive away, set the stage for another night of chaos.
But the clashes never eventuated after the previous night's deadly gun violence.
About 200 protestors defied a curfew and marched peacefully through the city's streets, law enforcement officers kept a low profile and armed militia groups didn't show.
'We are scared as black people in America'
That hasn't allayed the fears of locals.
"We're already in desperate times, this just keeps ratcheting up the pressure and desperate people under pressure make bad decisions," Kenosha resident Wade West said.
We spoke to him as he boarded up an outreach centre in town.
"The community is running on a broad spectrum of emotion. I think there is a lot of justifiable outrage," Mr West said.
"There's a lot of sadness, grief, destruction. There's anger about having outside forces coming in on both sides, and agitating, stirring the pot, really, fuelling the destruction and it didn't need to be this way."
He grew up in Minneapolis witnessing police brutality against his fellow African Americans and believes the leadership in the White House is stoking racial tensions.
"I think it's a hot mess, to give safe cover to racist voices, to give safe cover to ideologies that had existed but weren't acted upon as egregiously as they are right now," he said.
"I hope that someday we can mend that bridge, find common ground."
While the shooting of Mr Blake thrust police brutality against black Americans back into the media spotlight, it's the sporting world that might keep it there.
Women's National Basketball League players wore shirts printed with bullet holes. Major soccer games were postponed and Naomi Osaka pulled out of a tennis tournament.
NBA stars have called time, boycotting their matches and forcing the postponement of the playoffs.
"We are scared as a Black people in America," LA Lakers great Lebron James said.
LA Clippers coach Doc Rivers said "we've been hung, we've been shot and all you do is keep hearing about fear".
This is not the first-time sporting heroes have pointed out the gap between how black athletes are loved on the field and how they're treated off it.
And now they're sending a strong message to the white fans who love them on the court but perhaps remain disengaged with the Black Lives Matter movement.
Republicans are campaigning on 'law and order' platform
But far from acknowledging the actions of sporting stars and protesters who say enough is enough, the Republicans have focused their attention on the destruction in Kenosha.
As buildings went up in flames on Sunday night, the Republican party was just hours from launching its four-day convention.
At first glance, one might think the latest shooting of a black man at the hands of a white police officer and a city in flames would be an unwanted distraction.
But Kenosha becoming the latest flashpoint gave the party renewed firepower to stoke fears of lawless streets under a Joe Biden presidency, which it claims is overrun by radical left-wing democrats.
The destruction, rioting and looting that followed has provided a convenient backdrop for a party pitching for re-election on a platform of "law and order".
For three days, we've heard how everything is all good in America — except for the anarchists, the radical left, burning Democrat cities.
The vast majority of the speeches beamed to the public on prime-time cable TV were pre-recorded. So, this was the tune they had planned to sing all along.
As the saying goes, timing is everything in politics.
If Tuesday night's chaos, where heavily armed militias from out-of-town clashed with protestors, resulting in the shooting deaths of two people, is anything to go by, the rhetoric is working.
The 17-year-old boy who allegedly fired the shots, has been charged with first degree intentional homicide.
Kyle Rittenhouse travelled from Illinois with an AR-15 assault rifle. He says to protect businesses from the violent mobs taking over the streets of Kenosha.
It's been widely reported he's a Trump supporter and was pictured at the President's Iowa rally in January.
His Facebook profile, which has now been deleted, connected him to a group called Back the Blue and his feed describes a teenager obsessed with law enforcement and the Blue Lives Matter movement.
Instead of addressing the fatal shootings, the President tweeted he would be sending in federal law enforcement officers after Democrat Governor Tony Evers accepted his offer.
But there was some confusion over just how those conversations played out.
Another fault line appears in divided America
While we don't know what motivated Mr Rittenhouse, it's impossible to ignore how Trump's rhetoric echoes what has happened on the ground in the midwestern city.
On the first night of the convention, 24 hours before armed militias faced off with the angry mob, five speakers decried uncontrolled violent anarchists had taken over America's streets.
"Trump was elected to protect our families from the vengeful mob that seeks to destroy our way of life, our neighbourhoods, schools, churches and values," Charlie Kirk, a young conservative, said as he opened the evening.
He was followed by four other speakers echoing a similar message, including the McCloskys — husband and wife lawyers, who were charged with waving guns at protestors walking past their St Louis home in Missouri.
Vice-President Mike Pence continued on this theme last night. The memo was clear: support them or the looting, anarchy and protests would continue to tear US cities apart.
"You won't be safe in Joe Biden's America," he said.
"Let me be clear, the violence must stop, whether in Minnesota, Portland or Kenosha, we will have law and order on the streets of America."
It has become another fault line — pitting those wanting justice for black Americans against those wanting safety on the streets.
Sowing seeds of division is how Trump campaigned in 2016, adopting a strategy of us versus them as he sought to rouse a fringe base of supporters who felt the establishment had abandoned them.
This strategy appears no different. It seeks to appeal to his base while also bringing in the average white American, by spreading fear their suburbs are under threat from the violent mob.